


Pinestasia

by detectivejigsaw



Category: Anastasia (1997), Gravity Falls
Genre: Adventure, Anastasia crossover, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Extensive Artistic License, Found Family, Gen, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, Inspired by Artsymeeshee, Regaining Family, some horror
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-22
Updated: 2020-10-14
Packaged: 2021-03-04 20:46:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 24
Words: 37,655
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25442614
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/detectivejigsaw/pseuds/detectivejigsaw
Summary: Once upon a time in the kingdom of New Jersey, the land was ruled by a strong-willed, occasionally stupidly stubborn, yet brave and adventurous family: the Pines.However, thanks to horrible mistakes made by one member of the family (cough, STANFORD, cough), one night a terrible entity is unleashed on their household, and a massacre results in only a few of them left alive: two brothers, Stanford and Stanley, and (possibly) their beloved great-niece and nephew who vanished without a trace.Six years later, orphans Dipper and May are struggling to figure out who they truly are, and find the family that must have loved them, with their only clue being the necklaces they've owned as far back as they can remember which bear the inscription, "Together in Gravity Falls."  Unfortunately, they run afoul of numerous dangers, including a trio of unscrupulous con artists, child-snatching gnomes interested in underage marriage proposals-oh, and the evil boy possessed by a dream demon who's made it his life's goal to destroy them.You know, little problems like that.
Relationships: Dipper Pines & Ford Pines, Dipper Pines & Mabel Pines, Dipper Pines & Stan Pines, Fiddleford H. McGucket & Ford Pines, Ford Pines & Mabel Pines, Ford Pines & Stan Pines, Jesus "Soos" Alzamirano Ramirez & Stan Pines, Mabel Pines & Stan Pines, Mabel Pines & Waddles, Wendy Corduroy & Dipper Pines & Mabel Pines, Wendy Corduroy & Stan Pines
Comments: 284
Kudos: 94





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Anastasia AU](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/653632) by Artsymeeshee. 



Once upon a time, in a faraway land, there was a prosperous kingdom known as New Jersey. It was not the most elegant or sophisticated kingdom-its people were known for being belligerent and headstrong, to put it mildly, and its rulers were no exception-but for many, it was a wonderful home.

Speaking of its rulers, they were called the Pineses.

That was because Pines was their last name.

And at the time that this story begins, the Pines who was in charge of New Jersey was the eldest of three sons, Sherman. He was also the only son of the previous king (we don’t talk about him) who had produced heirs. And two of them in particular, who were (not so) secretly the favorites of his brothers, were his twin six-year-old grandchildren, Mason and Mabel.

Part of the favoritism might have come from the fact that Sherman’s brothers were twins themselves-and helped by the additional fact that neither of them was interested in taking the throne (unusual behavior for princes, that), and were quite happy for their great-niece and nephew to one day do so. Their interests lay more in traveling to other lands in search of adventure and discovery, of finding unusual creatures or buried treasure, whichever came first. And in particular, they enjoyed exploring the most unusual place in all the land: an uncanny valley known as Gravity Falls.

They would leave the kingdom for months at a time to spend time in the valley, returning with new discoveries to amuse and delight their family-but it broke the hearts of the children, who begged their uncles not to leave so much, or to take them to Gravity Falls with them. So that day in the palace, just before they were about to leave on another trip, the elder twins gave their niblings gifts to make the parting a little easier for everyone.

“A diary?” Mabel asked, squinting at the book that had been placed in her hands-pink, with an image of a shooting star set into it and encrusted with jewels.

“It’s a  _ journal _ !” Mason said emphatically, blushing as he accepted the other one his great-uncle was offering. He looked down with delight at the image of a pine tree engraved onto the front cover of his journal, and tried to open it, only to find it was locked.

Stanford, the older of the uncles by fifteen minutes, smiled and produced two chains with fancy pendants attached that matched the journals. “Try using these.”

Mabel was a little confused, but Mason figured out right away that the tiny pine tree fit into the center of the one that was on the cover of the journal; as soon as it clicked into place, the journal opened, revealing a series of  _ beautiful _ pages that could be written in, or drawn on, or whatever else their hearts might desire.

“They’re just like your journals, Grunkle Ford!” Mabel chirped in delight.

“Exactly! They’re a place for you two to write about your adventures so you can remember them for years to come. And I’ve been working on a spell to connect them to my journal, so we can write messages back and forth no matter how far apart we are.”

“ _ Whoa _ ,” Mason breathed, staring at his journal with delight. Mabel just launched herself into Ford’s arms and hugged him as tight as she could.

Stanley, the other twin (their father was not the most creative person on the planet when it came to names), hung back a little, his own presents to the twins still in his hands. They weren’t nearly as fancy as the ones Ford had given to the children, so he couldn’t help feeling upstaged before he’d even had a chance to offer them.

But then Mabel finished hugging Ford and bounced over to him, asking, “What’d  _ you _ get us, Grunkle Stan?”

He laughed awkwardly and rubbed the back of his neck. “Oh, just-y’know, just a few souvenirs for you little gremlins.” From behind his back he produced a bright blue and white hat, and a grappling hook.

Mason let out a pleased sound when he saw the hat-due to the unique birthmark on his forehead, he liked wearing them as much as possible-and hurried over to snatch it. Mabel accepted the grappling hook with equal pleasure, and launched herself into Stan’s arms.

“Just don’t tell your grandpa you got that from me,” he told her.

“Don’t worry, I won’t!”

“Stanley, you’re setting a bad example again,” Ford scolded.

“Can it, Sixer.”

The best part was still to come: Mason looked at the pendant as he hung it around his neck, and squinted at the writing he found.

“Together...in...Gravity Falls,” he read aloud. His mouth shaped itself into a little ‘o’ as the meaning sank in.

“Next summer your parents said you kids can finally come and stay with us!” Stan said proudly. “We can be a whole team of adventurers!”

This time he was nearly knocked over by tackle-hugs from two sides at once.

* * *

Unfortunately, it was not to be.

For what nobody knew was that Stanford Pines had made an egregious error which was about to rear its ugly head.

And one of its names was Gideon Gleeful.

He was a child not much older than Ford’s own niece and nephew, vastly interested in the mysteries of Gravity Falls, and for a while when they first met he had been happy to nurture that curiosity and take him on as a sort of apprentice. At least, until it turned out that the reasons behind the boy’s interest were far less noble than his own, and more based on a greedy desire to gain power and control over the valley, specifically by means of a magical amulet that Ford had discovered.

When his treachery had been uncovered, Ford had thrown Gideon out of the house on his ear and told him never to come back; enraged, the boy had drawn himself up and proclaimed that he  _ rebuked _ Stanford Pines, and that he and his entire family would pay recompense for his transgressions!!!!

(“Yeesh, do you have a word-of-the-day dictionary or something?” Stan had asked just before slamming the door in his face.)

Now, consumed by his hatred for Ford and his family, Gideon stood in a magical circle just outside the Pines’s palace, reading an incantation from a page he had copied out of the old man’s journal in order to summon a powerful entity that would destroy everything he held dear!

It happened without warning.

The Pines family had just had dinner in the great hall, and were heading outside to enjoy the evening, when it happened.

The sky turned blood red, and then it seemed like a part of it just  _ split _ , before a swarm of creatures that looked like something out of your worst nightmares appeared, cackling and gibbering madly as they descended towards the castle.

The king’s guard immediately attacked, using every weapon at their disposal-but it was clear that they weren’t going to be enough.

Everything was confusion and screaming and people running frantically back and forth; Mason and Mabel barely had time to process it, or hear the horrible, high-pitched cackling in the distance, before they were being snatched up into their grunkles’ arms and hurried away into the depths of the palace.

“This way! We can go out the servants’ quarters!” Stan yelled, rushing down a corridor towards his room. When he reached it, he pulled open a part of the wall to reveal a secret passageway which neither of the children knew existed, and which they would have been far more interested in investigating under different circumstances.

“Take them both!” Ford ordered, thrusting Dipper into Stan’s arms, “I’ll hold him off!”

“I’m not gonna leave you-” Stan started to argue.

“It’s  _ my _ fault He’s here,  _ I  _ need to deal with him! I’ll be fine, just-keep the children safe, Stanley!”

A tense moment passed between the two men, while the children stared between them in confusion and terror-just before one of the windows behind them smashed open, and a gibbering, blue-skinned creature with a keyhole shape in the middle of its head appeared. Ford slammed the door to the passageway shut, and there was a click as it shut.

Stan let out an anguished snarl, but then gathered the children more securely into his arms and took off running as fast as his old bones could move.

In all the confusion, nobody realized that the kids had left behind their journals.

* * *

Outside the palace, Stan barely stopped to glance over his shoulder at the burning, crumbling structure.

“You  _ better _ be okay, you knucklehead,” he muttered to himself, before readjusting his hold on each of the children and dashing into the forest along one side of the palace.

“Where are we goin’, Grunkle Stan?” Mabel worked up the courage to ask.

“It-it’s gonna be okay, sweetie,” Stan assured her with an attempt at a smile. “We’ve gotta get to the beach, and we can all be safe on the  _ Stan O’War _ . Okay? I’m gonna protect you, don’t be scared.”

The children clung to his coat as he ran, going as fast as his old legs could go, and pushing himself to go even faster.

Then, out of the blue another monster rose up through the trees: a giant set of teeth, with arms and legs but no eyes or nose. Stan gasped, and quickly set the kids on the ground before ripping a thick branch from a tree and wielding it like a club.

“Kids! Run! Go that way as fast as you can!” he ordered, pointing at a gap in the trees where you could just barely make out the blue of the ocean far ahead.

“B-b-but-Grunkle Stan-” Mason stammered; he stared at the giant teeth in a kind of transfixed horror as they grinned, and then came rushing towards them.

“NOW!”

Without further hesitation Mason grabbed his sister’s hand, and the two of them began to race through the trees. Behind them they could hear horrible crashing, smashing noises, and the sound of their grunkle’s wrathful roars as he fought the monster.

Unfortunately, neither of them realized in time that there was a slope in front of them.

Neither of them could stop from losing their footing, and tumbling head over heels down the slope, smashing into what seemed like everything that came into their path, before they were spilling into a roaring, rushing river.

The last thing Mason heard before he was swept away by the current was the sound of their grunkle’s anguished scream.

* * *

In just one night, the Pines family was torn apart.

Stanford just barely escaped the clutches of Gideon, and the dark forces he had become the servant of, but it was too late to save his family, or to stop the demons from ravaging the kingdom before disappearing.

Stanley fought off the teeth monster, but because he had failed to protect the children he was banished from what remained of the kingdom by his enraged, grieving sibling.

And nobody knew what had become of the young twins, who it seemed had been lost forever.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> How's that for a bleak opening?


	2. A rumor in Glass Shard Beach

**Six years later**

Glass Shard Beach, a small town on the coast of New Jersey, was a gloomy, bleak place-even by New Jersey’s standards.

All of the former kingdom had become a desolate, chaotic wasteland that honestly wouldn’t have looked out of place on a death metal album cover. All sorts of monsters regularly roamed the land, creating chaos wherever they went (and often eating any people who got in their way), and there were very few safe places left. Not even seagulls dared to land in town or on the beach anymore; too many of them had been eaten by what appeared to be harmless mailboxes, or creatures lurking beneath the sand, and so the smarter ones had learned to stay away.

Despite these challenges, the humans trapped here had adapted, as they are prone to do.

Grenda, a larger-than-usual girl with a strong body and an even stronger will, slammed her fist into the face of the giant carnivorous tree she was climbing, forcing some of the fruit that was attached to it to be shaken loose and fall into the basket that her friend Candy was holding, down below. The tree roared angrily, and one of its giant clawed branches tried to grab her, but she dodged farther down the trunk in the nick of time, so it ended up stabbing itself in the face instead, and caused even more fruit to fall.

“HA! IN YOUR FACE, LOSER!” she bellowed, before half-jumping, half climbing back to the ground.

Candy grinned at her, and the two girls made their way to the stand where they had set up a semi-profitable business.

It was in the devastated remains of an old supermarket, so it seemed like the perfect place to sell their wares. Because the building was mostly crumbling in on itself, most of the time monsters didn’t bother to go there, except for the occasional eye-bats, and even then their wares were usually easy to carry and therefore hide.

Soon enough customers arrived to trade weapons, water, or a number of other basic necessities for the food that the girls offered. As they stood in the line (and kept an eye out for predatory creatures), people gossiped to each other.

“Y’know, they say that there’s still some o’ the Pines family who’re still alive,” Edwin Durland mused as he offered Candy a handful of (badly woven) friendship bracelets for one of the fruits she was selling.

Candy gave him a stern look over the rims of her glasses. “You know the rules.”

Durland stared at her pleadingly, but she was unyielding, so at last he sighed and pulled a still-functioning taser from his belt. Candy accepted it (and the bracelets, somewhat pityingly) from him, in exchange for a basket of fruit. After all, it was hard to be in the business of gathering food unless you could protect yourselves.

“Yeah, I heard that too,” said Thompson, the boy standing next in line in order to get food for himself and his friends (who were allegedly playing lookout, but mostly seemed to be playing hacky-sack or, in Tambry's case, writing endlessly on her notepad). “That there’s a set of twins somewhere out there who’re the heirs to the throne. They say their great uncle’ll give a big reward to anyone who finds ‘em.”

“I’ve heard it’s a hundred years’ worth of food!” whined Toby, as determined (ha ha) as ever to spread news whenever he could.

“Is that even possible?” Thompson wondered.

“Of course it is!” ‘Lazy’ Susan snorted. “He’s a powerful alchemist or something, they can do anything!”

“Eye bats! Everyone hide!”

At the cry from Tambry, who had finally looked up from her notepad and noticed the approaching monster, everyone scattered left and right, into whatever corners could provide the most shelter; some of the more innovative members of the community even covered themselves with blankets designed to look like piles of rubble. One of the people who had been near the back of the line, a thickly-built young man who mostly resembled some kind of large, hairless gopher, seized the opportunity to zip forward, snatch some fruit which had been left in the open, and toss a handful of paper on the table.

“Hey, no cutting in line!” Thompson protested.

“Sorry dude, but it’s for the greater good!” He dodged into safety just in time to avoid being seen by the eye-bat.

As soon as it was gone, Candy climbed into view and cautiously lifted the papers. On top of them was one that had a hand-drawn picture of a strange-looking cartoon man, and the words “Stan Buck” scrawled on top; beneath it were a set of flyers.

They began with the words, “Do you want to be a royal?”

* * *

Soos, as far as he knew, was not related to gophers. He got compared to one a lot, but his abuelita had assured him that he was as human as you could get, and he trusted her 100%. What he did feel like right now was honestly-well, kind of a thief, even though he’d (technically) paid for the food. The boss had assured him it was for the greater good, but he was still a little perturbed as he rushed back to the outskirts of town. Specifically, to an old wrecked ship resting on the shore.

He wasn’t sure where the ship had come from; it had been there at _least_ since the day after the sky had first turned red, and day and night were no longer easy to tell apart. It was an enormous, double-masted thing, with the part on the front smashed in from when it had hit the jagged rocks on the shore, and it used to have sails but now all it had were tattered shreds. There used to be a name plate attached to the side, but now all that could be made out was the word “WAR.” Soos wondered if that meant it used to be a battleship.

He had gone out to explore it once when he was seventeen, just to have some fun for once, and had discovered two of the most important people in his life besides Abuelita. Two people who he was going to help now with the best plan ever.

Soos knocked in a special rhythm on the hull of the ship when he reached it; after a second a skinny redheaded girl peered out from one of the holes in the hull (heh heh, holes in the hull-that was like a kind of rhyme or something) that served as a window.

“Soos! Didja get it done?”

“Piece of cake, dude!” Soos gave her a thumbs up as he came inside.

“Good.”

It was another voice that spoke: one very old, and gruff, and usually pretty grumpy unless it was talking about money or (on very, VERY rare occasions) when it was talking to him or Wendy. It belonged to the very old, gruff, usually pretty grumpy man sitting in the old yellow armchair in a corner of the ship. He accepted the basket of fruit, rifling through it until he found one that was as unbruised as possible. “Everything’s goin’ accordin’ ta plan. Now we just need some suckers ta come to us.”

Soos felt a small twinge in his (not nearly as large as it had been when he was younger; the nourishment was kind of limited right now) gut. He coughed, and cleared his throat.

“Um...Mr. Boss...you sure this is...I dunno...a good idea?”

The boss bit into the fruit, which made a loud crunching noise, and passed the basket back to him. “Course I am. It was one o’ mine.”

Soos and Wendy sat down on the big skull belonging to some long-extinct creature which served as the only other chair in this place and helped themselves to their breakfast. “But Mr. Boss, won’t the king _know_ whether they’re his real niece and nephew or not?”

At the word ‘king,’ the boss made a disgusted snorting noise, and looked for a second like he was about to spit on the floor but just barely remembered in time that they were in his (sort of) house and he didn’t wanna step in it later. “Kid, if everything goes how it’s supposed to, he won’t know ‘till we’ve already snatched the reward and gotten outta this dump.”

“That’s awfully reassuring,” Wendy muttered dryly.

“Can it, red,” he told her. “Hurry up and eat; we got preparations ta make.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not everything is as it seems.


	3. Journey to the Past

We now move away from Glass Shard and zoom in on a small hamlet further inland, in a part of New Jersey where it is almost constantly covered in snow, as a consequence of the weirdness blight. This hamlet is called Piedmont, and right now, at the Piedmont Home for Wayward Children, a pair of twelve-year-olds are being herded out to the gates (specially reinforced to protect against monster attacks) by a tall, blond man who can somehow handle wearing shorts and a polo shirt despite the frigid weather, and who always wears a whistle around his neck.

* * *

If you asked Dipper, or his sister May, Mr. Poolcheck was not the ideal caretaker for children. It wasn’t like there were many other options available for the job around here, but Dipper couldn’t help wondering if there was anyone a little more...emotionally stable who would be more suited. But of course, nobody ever asked him about stuff like that.

“Aren’t-um, aren’t we a little young to be getting a job, Mr. Poolcheck-” he started to protest, stumbling over his slightly-too-big boots through the thick snow.

“Of course not! The taffy shop needs people who are just your size to scrape barnacles off the front of it! I was twelve when  _ I  _ first started a trade. Which is how I lost my  _ hand _ !” He pulled off his prosthetic and waved it in their faces-one of his favorite methods of disciplining unruly children was by reminding them of how little right they had to complain when they had things so much easier than he ever did.

“Ooh, you  _ do _ have the key to the snack cupboard in there! I was right!” May tried to reach into the stump of Mr. Poolcheck’s arm; he used his prosthetic hand, which he was still holding in the other one, to smack her wrist. “Ow!”

They reached the outside gates, and were pushed out past their safety.

“Go straight to the fork in the road, and turn left, and you can’t miss it!” he told them. “They promised to teach you about discipline and sense, both of which you’re gonna need-”

Dipper and May rolled their eyes and muttered the next part in unison with him: “-if you wanna survive in this anarchy-ridden world of ours!”

Mr. Poolcheck glared at them. “Maybe a few weeks of hard labor will also teach you some respect for your elders.” And he slammed the gates.

Since there was nothing else for them to do, the children began making their way to the path. May skipped along happily enough, kicking up huge footfuls of snow and doing occasional little twirls.

“Yay, snow!!!!” she cheered.

“It’s the same kind of snow that was at the orphanage, May,” Dipper felt obligated to point out.

“Except that it’s  _ outside _ snow, Dipper!” May twirled again. “It’s the snow of  _ freedom _ !”

“We’re being forced into child labor. There is no freedom whatsoever.”

May put her hands on her hips. “Well, not if you look at it with  _ that _ attitude!”

Dipper rolled his eyes and shoved his own hands into his pockets.

For a while they walked in relative silence, until at last they reached the fork-literally, there was a giant fork stabbed tines-first into the road in the spot where it branched off into two separate ways. A signpost had been set up on the fork, and despite all odds no rampaging monsters or people had demolished it yet. One arrow pointed to the left, and had “Lower Piedmont” written on it in black letters. The other pointed right, and indicated that it led to “Glass Shard Beach.”

Dipper looked at the “Lower Piedmont” side with distaste. “...We know what’s that way. We’ll be a pair of unwanted orphans stuck in a dead-end job for the rest of our lives.”

May wrinkled her nose. “So why are we  _ doing  _ it? We should go right instead! That way maybe we can find out whoever gave us these!” And she pulled a tiny necklace out from under her coat.

Neither of them knew where they had come from or who had given them to them, but they were the most precious items they owned: a pair of gold chains, each with a fancy pendant. One of them was a blue representation of a pine tree, and the other a multicolored shooting star. And both of them had the words “Together in Gravity Falls” engraved on them.

Dipper couldn’t help pulling his out too and looking at it.

“Whoever it was  _ had _ to have loved us,” May said, a little more solemnly than usual. “Maybe if we go this way, we can find out who they are! And who  _ we _ are!”

“Yeah, if they weren’t eaten by monsters,” Dipper muttered. Unlike his sister, he had a hard time looking on the bright side of things.

“Come on, Dipper! Isn’t it worth the possibility?”

The boy made a frustrated sound, and dug the toe of his boot through the snow.

Because on the one hand, they were a pair of twelve-year-olds with no supplies, weapons or experience in the real world, and with their luck they’d get killed the instant they headed for Glass Shard Beach instead of the comparative safety of the taffy shop. But on the other hand...May had a point.

If there was a chance of finding out if they had a family somewhere, like this Gravity Falls place, wherever that was…

_ If there’s a being up there, give us a sign of some kind! Or just a hint! Anything to tell us where to go- _

“OH MY GOSH A PIG!!!!”

* * *

Sure enough, on the road towards Glass Shard Beach there had appeared a pink, chubby-looking pig, trotting through the snow and making little grunting noises as it came closer and closer.

“May, wait!” Dipper seized the back of her coat before she could go racing towards it. “It could be a shapeshifter, or a Puppeteer demon or something! We can’t trust it!”

“But Dip-per, it’s a  _ pig _ !” May whined. She looked over to see that it was now sitting in the road, probably freezing its poor hooves in all this snow, and looking at her with its head tilted in the most adorable way  _ ever _ . “He could be my soulmate!”

“We don’t  _ know _ that for sure! Have you forgotten about that time when you tried to catch those ‘squirrels’ that immediately tried to eat us?”

May’s lip trembled. He was right, and she knew he was right...but that didn’t make it any less unfair.

Dipper sighed. “Look...if it’s a real pig, and not something that’ll hurt us, then you can keep it.”

Seconds later he was being knocked back into the snow by his sister’s tackle hug.

After May was done hugging him, they approached the pig at a cautious pace, and Dipper pulled out his notebook.

It was an old, beat-up thing that was more a bunch of papers stapled together than an actual research journal like he wished he owned, but it contained all the information he had ever discovered about the creatures that plagued New Jersey.

“Okay,” he muttered, flipping through and looking at his descriptions of different creatures, “it seems substantial enough so far, so that rules out a ghost. Look at its eyes. Are they a weird color?”

May crouched down, uncaring about getting her knees wet, and peered into the pig’s eyes. “Nope. They are big and dark and filled with determination and sweetness!”

Dipper rolled his eyes a little, but accepted the verdict. “Okay, next test.” He pulled out a few charms that had protective spells on them, and waved them at the pig. It blinked, and then tried to take a bite out of them.

At last, he had to concede that the pig was probably what it seemed to be, and seemed harmless enough. May squealed happily, and threw her arms around it.

“I’m gonna name you Waddles! Because you waddle when you walk!”

Dipper still wasn’t sure if this was a good idea; they didn’t have the supplies needed to feed  _ themselves _ , let alone themselves and a pig, and his scent had an extremely high risk of attracting predators.

But having him as part of the group did seem like it would make May happy, and her happiness was one of the most important things in the world to him. And he had appeared just when Dipper had been asking for a sign about which direction they should go, and never let it be said that Dipper whatever-his-last-name-was couldn’t take a hint.

So, with their new pet trotting at their side and hearts unfailing, the two children began wandering down the road towards Glass Shard Beach, in hopes that a newer, brighter future awaited them.

Possibly one with love and family at the end of the journey.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, I know this chapter ends on a slightly schmaltzy note. But so does the song the chapter title is named for; gimme a break.


	4. Once Upon a Summer

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Check out this GORGEOUS fanart at Scar's Gravity Falls Dump: https://suddengftrash.tumblr.com/post/624934506633347072/i-was-reading-detectivejigsawpines-anastasia-au

To the childrens’ relief, the protective charms they were wearing seemed to work, because they were able to walk mostly undisturbed by predators, except for one instance where they had to hide from a giant goat that stomped past, bleating and chewing on the tops of trees as it went. Neither of them were sure if it would actually eat them, but they were taking no chances.

It was only after several hours of walking that they finally came to the end of the snow line.

Literally, at the end of the road the snow just stopped, and in front of them was a wide stretch of sand that appeared to have large shards of glass sticking up out of it. In the distance they could hear the sound of waves crashing on a shore; for some reason the noise sent chills racing down Dipper’s spine.

“...Looks like we’re here,” he said dryly.

May knelt down, and immediately started trying to pick Waddles up.

“Dipper, help me carry Waddles.”

The boy gave her an exasperated look. “Why-”

“His hooves are too delicate to walk on that! He could cut himself!”

Dipper thought about protesting...but if he refused, most likely May would just try to carry the pig all by herself, and get worn out faster. Besides, he could see a few seagull skeletons impaled on the ends of some of the bigger shards. With a small shudder, he went over and helped her lift Waddles.

“Maybe we should just find you a baby carrier or something.”

“That would be _amazing_!”

Gingerly they crossed over the snowy barrier onto the beach-and instantly the temperature changed from freezing cold to far more clement, warm summer weather.

Dipper made a disgusted noise as his warm clothes suddenly turned stifling. “Hold on, let’s put him back on the snow for a second. I feel like I’m about to get heat stroke.”

As soon as they did, the children both tugged off their long coats, hats and scarves, and rolled up their sleeves as high as they could. But they left their boots on to protect them from the broken glass, and after a bit of indecision just ended up tying the clothes into a bundle which May slung across one shoulder. Then they began their trek across the perilous sands, towards a dark blob they could see in the far distance which was probably (hopefully) a town of some kind.

At least there was no sun anymore, so they didn’t have to worry about getting sunburned; just a seemingly endless expanse of red sky, with a multicolored X-shape that always hung in its center no matter where you were. The stories they’d heard all claimed that that was where the monsters had come through, six years ago, on the day the sky turned red.

Dipper often wondered what was on the other side, and when he was younger he’d thought about climbing the tallest tree in the forest to see if he could reach it.

...Which was how he’d wound up with a broken wrist when he was eight, and been lectured for an hour by Mr. Poolcheck for “rendering himself unfit for duty.”

“So what’s the plan, bro-bro?” May finally asked.

Dipper briefly raised one of his arms and wiped the sweat from his forehead. “Find out where Gravity Falls is from here, and then go there. Hopefully after getting some supplies first.”

It wasn’t the most complex plan he’d ever come up with, but it did cover the basics pretty thoroughly as far as he was concerned.

May nodded approvingly. “Good plan!”

“Thanks.” Dipper continued to walk resolutely. “Let’s just hope we can find someone who’ll be willing to help us.”

* * *

“...Definitely not,” Stan said, looking at the makeshift stage with an extremely unimpressed glare.

“You sure?” Wendy asked with a slightly teasing smile, “He _is_ about the right height for the job.”

“He’s literally a middle-aged man, Wendy. Pretty sure the king’s not that dumb. Next!”

“Awwww, marbles!” Toby lowered the cane he’d been tap-dancing with (nobody understood why he’d felt that need) and sulkily made his way offstage.

So far they were having no luck in finding someone to play the Pines twins. People came to the wrecked ship trying to pose as one or both children, were looked over for a moment by Stan, and almost immediately sent away again.

Granted, some of the prospects were pitiful at best; sad to say not many children in this town had survived long enough to reach their twelfth birthday, so the majority of options they had to work with were adults and teenagers. The closest they’d found were a pair of genuine twins who did bear a striking resemblance to the painting of the Pines family that was still intact in the crumbling remains of the palace, but after looking them over Stan had sent Shmipper and Smabble away too.

Wendy gave him a confused look. “What the heck, man? They were perfect!”

“They’re not what I’m looking for,” the old man growled.

“But they’re actual _twins_! What’re the odds we’re gonna find anyone else around here who fits better?”

“I know what I’m lookin’ for, Wendy. Now shut your yap.” Stan turned his attention back towards the stage...where a hulking girl in a tattered pink shirt was lumbering onstage.

“GREAT UNCLE! IT’S ME-MABEL!” she bellowed, before punching a hole through the wall behind her.

“And I am your loving nephew Mason!” said the petite Asian girl with the glasses who climbed onto the stage next to her friend, adjusting her hair so it was better tucked under the hat she was wearing. “Wassup, bro. Let’s grow some mustaches!”

Stan banged his head on the table.

* * *

By the time the twins reached the outskirts of town, they were both exhausted and starving, and they’d had a few close encounters with whatever monster was lurking beneath the sand _and_ been forced to run to avoid some bubbles of pure chaos. They both needed a break, big time.

“Can we put Waddles down, please?” Dipper pleaded, hating how pathetic he sounded but too exhausted to care that much. “My arms are about to fall off.”

May looked around, and once she was satisfied that there were no lethal spikes of glass anywhere she nodded, and together they set the pig on the ground. He immediately licked May’s hand with a happy grunt.

She squealed happily, and squished his face between her hands. “Eeeeee, your face is so fat!!!!”

Dipper straightened up and began trying to get the feeling back into his arms, while keeping an eye out for monsters. “Let’s look for shelter somewhere and get some rest, and then we can start asking around.”

“Good idea!” May praised him. She looked down at her pig. “Waddles! Find us shelter!”

“He’s not a dog!” Dipper said in exasperation, “And either way, he probably hasn’t been trained to understand-”

Waddles snorted a few times, and then trotted off in a way that seemed very purposeful.

May gave Dipper a smug smile. “See? He’s like our _spirit guide_!”

“He probably just smells a corncob or something!” But the children both chased after the pig.

To their mutual surprise, Waddles wandered away from the main part of town, towards an enormous, decaying building that was mostly encircled by the forest. It made Dipper a little nervous, because the forest was where most of the monsters lurked, but the building in front of him did look pretty cool, so he happily climbed the stairs towards the smashed-in front door.

“Why did you bring us here, Waddles?” May asked aloud, looking down at her pig.

Waddles grunted, and stepped inside.

Dipper felt a small rush of nervousness-what if Waddles was some kind of demonic lure after all?-but he just gripped the protective charms that were in his pocket, and stepped inside after him.

“Whoa,” May breathed, looking around.

Dipper had to agree with her.

Despite the tangles of cobwebs and giant scorch marks that covered everything, he could tell that this place had once been a pretty majestic house. Maybe even a palace of some kind.

And it looked like there’d been a full-out war here, long ago. The scorch marks were accompanied by huge piles of ash, and there were spots where it looked like something with giant claws had torn straight through the walls. To Dipper’s relief, all the damage looked pretty old, so hopefully whatever had caused this mess was long gone and therefore wouldn’t come after him or his sister.

Everything was quiet, except for their footsteps and the occasional grunt from Waddles. Not even a breeze disturbed the shredded tapestries still hanging here and there on the walls. It gave Dipper a few shivers down his spine.

When May unexpectedly said his name, he almost jumped out of his skin.

“What?!”

She laughed a little at how obviously startled he was, but then said in an unusually serious tone, “Dipper...I think I remember this place.”

“...You’re kidding, right?”

“No, I-this place seems kinda...familiar. Doesn’t it?”

Dipper looked nonplussed. “Huh?”

“Oh, I dunno how to explain it.” May spun around as they stepped into what must have been the main part of the house. “I just-I know this house. It’s like I dreamed about it, or...like we’ve been here before.”

“...It’s probably just deja vu.”

But, come to think of it, Dipper had to admit that when he looked around this part of the building...something felt a little familiar. Specifically, when he wandered over to the staircase and ran his fingers across an engraving on one of the pillars, which kind of looked like a weird hand with an extra finger on the end.

_The sound of his own voice giggling as a pair of warm hands wrapped around his middle and lifted him up, setting him at the top of the banister._

_“Okay, ready to slide?” a deep voice asked._

_“Yeah! Let’s do this!”_

Dipper blinked, and the feeling was gone.

Quickly he pulled away from the banister, and turned left; the main bedrooms were that way, so maybe-

Wait.

How did he know that?

...Well, it was just logic, right? That wing of the building looked more...comfortable, or something, so of course that’d be where the bedrooms were.

“May, I think we oughta try looking over here,” he called to his sister, who was-for some reason, she and Waddles had started dancing around in a circle in the middle of the room, while she sang some kind of nonsense song to herself.

Dipper smiled in fond exasperation, and turned to go check them out himself-

A figure with a hideous green face was standing right in front of him, hands raised and curved into claws, ready to pounce.

“BOO!”


	5. Once Upon a Summer, continued

May was snapped right out of the wonderful fantasy she’d been experiencing, in which she was dancing around with a number of people who all seemed strangely familiar, by the sound of her brother screaming.

She whirled around, snatching one of her favorite weapons out of her pocket, in time to see the enormous green-faced monster that had frightened Dipper reach up and, of all the horrifying things, pull off its own head!

...just before it started cackling at Dipper, who thankfully only stumbled a little before landing on the step behind him, rather than falling all the way down the stairs.

It took May a confused moment to realize that there was another head on the monster’s shoulders, and that the monster wasn’t a monster at all, just an old, gray-haired man who’d been wearing a green monster mask. She put her weapon back.

He was dressed in very shabby clothes, all black save for a bright red scarf wrapped around his neck, and a funny red hat perched on top of his head; May couldn’t remember what it was called, but she liked the long black tassel hanging from it. There was a faded symbol of some kind on the front, but she couldn’t tell what it was.

The old man was still laughing, and slapping his knee as he watched Dipper scramble to his feet with an affronted scowl. Abruptly he began to cough on his own laugh, and pounded his chest with his fist.

“...It was worth it!” he choked out in a growly kind of voice.

Dipper glared at him as he snatched a protective charm out of his pocket, waving it in front of him.

“S-s-s-stay away from me!” he ordered in a voice that might have sounded a little more impressive if it hadn’t started cracking.

The old man snorted and shoved the charm out of his face. “Eh, put that away, squirt, you’re gonna haveta try harder than that ta hurt me.”

Dipper stepped back, still watching him warily. “What do you want?”

One bushy gray eyebrow raised in an unimpressed fashion, as the man leaned on a cane with what looked like an 8-ball on the end of it. “This is my house. You two are the ones who broke-”

His eyes darted over to May-and he froze.

“...in.”

May stared back at him as she wandered closer to the stairs, with Waddles trotting at her side.

The old guy looked back and forth between them, wearing a kind of funny expression; his mouth had dropped open a little, and a lot of the color had gone out of his face. And she could have sworn that for a second his eyes became very very shiny, before he blinked a couple of times and seemed to compose himself.

As he did that, two figures appeared at the top of the next flight of stairs and came rushing down to his side.

“Mr. Boss, what happened?!” A largely built young man in tattered green and brown clothes reached the old man’s side first. “Wendy and I heard the sounds of screaming, and we thought something had happened to you!”

“ _He_ thought something had happened to you,” the red-haired woman behind him drawled, “ _I_ was pretty sure it was more likely that you’d happened to someone.” Her eyes landed on the two children, and she gasped in almost the same way that her ‘boss’ had.

“...What’s everyone looking at?” the young man asked. “Are you dudes havin’ a staring contest or something? Cuz I think Stan’s winning.”

Without a word Wendy grabbed his chin and turned it towards the kids. He blinked for a second...and then his eyes widened. “Ohhhhh, I get it now.”

“Um, hi, I’m May.” She decided it was time to break the awkward silence. “Does one of you know how to get to Gravity Falls?”

Finally Stan spoke. “Gr-” he cleared his throat- “Gravity Falls?”

“Uh-huh. Me and Dipper need to go there.” She climbed up the stairs to stand next to her brother.

“Whoa, dude, that’s actually a really funny coincidence, cuz we’ve-”

“Can it, Soos!” Stan took a step forward, peering intently at both children through his glasses. Dipper pulled back uncomfortably.

“You kids got names?” Stan asked.

“Like I said, I’m May,” May reminded him. “This is my brother Dipper, and my pig, Waddles!” She knelt and half-lifted her pet so she could wave one of his hooves. “He’s the newest member of our family.”

“...Uh-huh. So, you wanna go ta Gravity Falls, do ya?” Stan tilted his head. “You got family there or somethin’?”

“...We think so,” Dipper said at last. He still looked suspicious, but he was clearly trying to be brave.

“Yeah, cuz we’ve got-” Before May could tell him about their necklaces, she felt an elbow jabbing into her ribs.

“It’s just a wild hunch. It’s where we think they were before the sky turned red.” Dipper gave her his ‘play along’ expression.

They never told _anyone_ about their necklaces, out of fear that they might be stolen from them, or something worse. And May had to admit that her desire to tell these people they’d barely met about them was maybe a little impulsive even for her, so she just nodded.

Stan just knelt down until he was on their level, keeping one hand braced on the top of his cane.

“What’re you two doing so far away from them, then?”

The twins looked at each other, and a brief unspoken conversation passed between them. Finally May looked back at Stan.

“We don’t know. We can’t actually remember them that well.”

Dipper swallowed and added, “We were found wandering in the woods when we were six, and we couldn’t remember anything about who we were or where we’d come from. Our only clue is that it’s got something to do with Gravity Falls.”

The old man was giving them that look again-almost like he was searching for something. Finally he used the cane to help him stand up, and made something in his back crack.

“...Either of you two heard of the Pines twins?”

* * *

It was too good to be true.

It had to be.

Either these two kids were just what Stan needed to pull this off...or they were actually-

No, he wasn’t going to get his hopes up. He’d done that before, way too many times.

Dipper was definitely suspicious of him; he kept watching them like he expected an attack from them at any second, and his hand was on the tiny knife that he probably thought he was concealing in his belt.

_Good survival instincts, kid._

May sat down on the stairs behind her, half-pulling her pig into her lap and clearly far more relaxed about the situation. “We know that they’ve been missing ever since the day the sky turned red, and no one knows what happened to them.”

“Yeah, that’s the gist of it. But I’m looking at you two, and I can’t help thinking…” He gestured to the wall behind them. “Go up there and have a look, wouldya?”

Up there was an old, torn painting that was one of the only mostly intact things left in the palace. I say ‘mostly’ because part of it had been ripped, slashing through the faces of several of the grownups who had been standing together in the center. The only part that could be made out clearly anymore were the two children sitting side by side in the center: a shy-looking boy and a girl who was smiling far more than most would consider appropriate for a formal portrait.

May bounced up the stairs to get a closer look; Dipper followed at a more leisurely pace.

“Whoa,” May breathed, “They kinda look like us, don’t they?”

“Exactly.”

Dipper turned slowly, giving him a skeptical frown. “What’re you playing at, old man?”

 _Crap_.

Stan put on his best poker face. “You said it yourselves, neither of you know who you are, and you look like you’re just the right age. And they say that the last member of the royal family’s somewhere in Gravity Falls, right where you think your family is.”

“Yeah, dude,” Wendy agreed, having clearly caught on to her boss’s scheme. She went over to the kids. “Why’s that such an impossible thing to believe?”

As she came closer, Dipper’s face turned a little red, and he was suddenly not quite capable of looking her in the eye. Stan could guess the reason why; he smirked inside. “Uh-well-it’s-”

“Besides,” Soos cut in, “how many orphan sets of twins who look that much like _them_ do ya think are wandering around?”

“You’re both, what, twelve?” Wendy asked.

Dipper straightened up. “Almost thirteen. So technically almost teenagers.”

 _...Smooth, kid._ Real _smooth._

But hey, if his obvious crush on Stan’s employee could help bring them on board with the plan, it was worth it.

“You really think we could be them?” May asked; her brown eyes had become so big and shiny that there were more than just stars in them-they were practically comets.

Stan shrugged. “There’s one way ta find out. We can help you get ta Gravity Falls and see if the king recognizes you.”

“...And if he doesn’t, it’s just a mistake and no harm, no foul?” Dipper folded his arms.

Stan shrugged. “Sure. But if he does, you’ll know who you are, and have your family back.”

_...And so will I._

“So what’s in it for you?”

“Well, there’s a big reward-” Stan elbowed Soos- “...rewarding experience for us, you know, helping restore the royal family and all. Besides, things are getting pretty lousy around here, and we wanna try a change of scenery-”

“So, whaddya say?” Stan decided to intervene, holding out his hand.

The kids looked at each other again...and then first Dipper, then May, shook. “Okay. We’ll go to Gravity Falls with you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ah, cruel dramatic irony. How it affects everything the characters say and do.


	6. In the Dark of the Night

None of the little group realized that they were being watched.

High, high up on the topmost floor of the palace, there crouched a young girl wearing a potato sack dress under a tattered llama sweater, and who despite everything had managed to keep her mane of long blonde hair more or less tame and neat, though it had lost a lot of its former glossiness. She watched the little party, and thanks to the acoustics of the room she could more or less hear everything they were saying.

* * *

The Northwests had once been some of the highest ranking nobles of the royal court-not necessarily liked by everyone due to some shadier moments in their family history, but no one could deny how wealthy or influential they were.

All that had changed, however, on the day the sky turned red.

Preston Northwest, in a misguided desire to save his own skin, had come forward during a break in the battle and tried to offer his services to the fiend who had been brought into their dimension; the response had been...less than favorable, since instead the demon thought it would be fun to switch around all the orifices of his face. Even after it was finally vanished and the awful boy who’d been a host for him disappeared, Preston had remained disfigured, and he and his wife Priscilla had fled the wreckage of the palace in disgrace.

In all the commotion they had left behind their only daughter, Pacifica.

The little six-year-old, frightened by all the destruction going on around her, had fled into one of the upper wings of the palace, and hid under a bed until the noises stopped. When she came out at last, most of the people were gone, including the royal family, and everything was in ruins.

She’d sat on the staircase for a while and waited for her parents to come for her...but they never did.

Nobody she asked seemed to know or care where they were, and the survivors who moved through the palace to loot it for supplies would stare at her in distaste for being the daughter of a traitor. Most painful of all was when she heard one servant whisper to another, “There’s the Northwest brat. Just another link in the world’s worst chain.”

And somehow, Pacifica had just never left.

A few people had been kind enough to give her some supplies, and some protective charms to ward off monsters from ever coming here, but for the most part they treated her like she was a plague victim.

For the first time in her young life Pacifica was forced to do things herself. She had to learn to find food for herself, and how to wash herself, and even how to dress herself (her parents had functioned under the creed of “Never do for yourself what you can get a servant to do for you”). She kept herself entertained by reading the books that were still mostly intact in the library, and playing minigolf on the floor of the ballroom (there had been plenty of holes smashed into it during the battle that made it perfect for this).

Occasionally, she went into town and traded anything she could for supplies; at first she hid her distinctive hair under a rag and wouldn’t look anyone in the eye, but after a few years most people no longer recognized her as the “Northwest brat,” and she saw no reason to reveal that to them, so she stopped worrying about it. It wasn’t happiness by a long shot...but it was a weird kind of peace.

Then, when she was ten, one of the Pines family came back to the palace.

It was one of the older twins; Pacifica thought he was named Stanley. She faintly remembered that he and her father got into a lot of arguments, and once even a (slightly one-sided) fist fight, but he’d never been actually _unkind_ to her, as long as she didn’t give him or his niece and nephew “that Northwest attitude.” Even so, she hid upstairs and just watched him walk around for a while before he finally left.

He never stayed for long, but sometimes he and his two servants would make themselves comfortable in one of the rooms for the night. Pacifica would sneak up and listen to them talking and laughing for hours on end, and wish she could be a part of it.

* * *

Now all of them were here, along with two children (and a pig) who Stanley was claiming were the Pines twins.

Pacifica stared at them with wide eyes. The Pines twins? Alive? She’d thought those stories were just rumors!

And then, to her alarm, the jewel around her neck began to glow.

...I should probably explain about that.

Pacifica had found the pale green amulet lying amongst the rubble one day while looking for something good to trade in town. It was the most beautiful thing she’d seen in years...and despite knowing that she probably ought to trade it to someone in exchange for extra food, she missed being able to dress up in finery whenever she wanted. So she kept it, and sometimes she would walk back and forth in front of the mirror pretending she was the belle of the ball instead of a half-starved waif, while wearing it on a ribbon around her neck.

This was the first time she’d ever seen it do this before.

Out of the blue the ribbon came loose; Pacifica lifted a hand to catch it, but instead of falling, the amulet actually rose into the air, and started floating away.

“Hey!” She grabbed for it, but it moved out of her reach. Pacifica growled; there was no way she was losing this, on top of everything else! Without thinking about it much, she lunged and closed her hand around the amulet.

...Which began to rise into the air, pulling her up with it, and just kept on rising, right up through the hole in the roof and into the forest.

“Whoa, hey! Stop it! You’re my possession; obey me!”

All her commands were to no avail. The amulet began to accelerate faster and faster, and carried her onward, so the tips of her shoes brushed against the tops of the trees.

Pacifica clung to the amulet with all her might, not sure if she was more terrified that she was going to fall, or that she _wasn’t_ going to fall. Branches lashed against her legs, and for a terrifying moment she thought an eye-bat that lunged upwards out of the trees was going to turn her into stone. Before it could see her, though, the amulet stopped short, and then dived down into the woods.

Pacifica closed her eyes and flung one of her arms up over her face, but still felt some branches tearing her skin and hair until at last she came tumbling to a crash on the forest floor.

“Oh...ow…” Pacifica sat up with a groan, rubbing one of her shoulders where it had collided with a big branch. She looked around, and saw that she had landed in a wide clearing that was surrounded by the freakiest trees ever. They were enormous, vicious-looking things, big and black, with branches that were curved and twisted like long, grasping claws, and stretched all the way around until they created a sort of dome overhead, with only a small gap that she was guessing she had just crashed through. The amulet lay a few feet away, where it had rolled loose from her hand. However, it had lost a lot of its appeal during the last five minutes, so she didn’t bother trying to grab it again.

Hesitantly she got to her feet and turned in a little circle-and jumped back with a small shriek when she saw the boy standing in the center of the clearing.

* * *

Once upon a time, he might have been considered cute.

Not in a “wow, he’s so attractive” kind of way, in an “awww, what an adorable little munchkin” kind of way. He had very thick and fluffy-looking white-blond hair, and a chubby little body with freckled cheeks and a little piggy nose, and wore a baby blue suit and what looked to Pacifica like a pair of tap shoes.

However, his skin was a ghastly gray-white color, even a bit green in a few spots, and his eyes ringed with shadows. His hair and suit were both torn and ragged, and had a few gross stains on them that Pacifica was _hoping_ were just really weird plant stains or something. As for the shoes, they were practically brown with dirt and muck.

When his bloodshot eyes landed on her, they widened, before he abruptly glared and marched towards her.

“Who are you?! How _dare_ you intrude upon mah solitude?!” he squealed, his meaty little hands clenching into fists.

Pacifica backed up just in case he was about to try to touch her. “Ugh, you think I _wanted_ to come here?! I was just-”

But suddenly he jerked back with a surprised squeak. “Wait a minute. You-you’re really here. You somehow got through the barrier! That must mean-” A second later he lunged at her. “How did you get in here?!”

But as he did, the tip of his shoe lodged itself under a tree root, and as his head snapped forward-his eye popped out, and landed with a _plop_ in Pacifica’s outstretched hand.

“AUGH!” She screamed in disgust and flung it away; as much disgusting stuff as she’d been forced to do over the years, she waved her hand about helplessly before wiping it on her dress.

“Hey! I need that!” The creepy boy raced after his eye, and after he retrieved it he cleaned it off on his sleeve before popping it back into his head. When he turned, he had regained some of his composure.

“I do apologize, ma’am, I think we got off on the wrong foot here. What do you say we start over?” He gave her a really cheesy-looking bow. “I am Li’l Gideon, and it is such a _gift_ to meet you!” Gideon raised his head and smiled at her, which _might_ have looked more charming without the broken, yellow teeth that were put on display. “Such a gift.”

Pacifica made a sound of distaste in the back of her throat. “...Hi.”

“May I have the pleasure of knowin’ your name, milady?”

“Pacifica.” Not using her full name had become second nature by now, so she didn’t bother adding the title of Northwest.

Gideon looked at her thoughtfully. “...You aren’t by chance a member of the Pines family, are you?”

Pacifica made a disgusted sound. “Do I _look_ like I’m related to them?! Even in a potato sack I still look better than they do!”

There was no real heart in her words, but Gideon didn’t seem to notice; he gasped, hard enough that his lower jaw unhinged itself. “You mean the Pines family’s still alive?!”

“Uh, just one of the old men and the kids, that’s all I saw-” Pacifica was having a little trouble focusing on his words. “Uh, your-your mouth, it’s kinda-”

He was no longer listening. “No wonder I’m still stuck in this trap Stanford created! Not only did I lose my connection to Bill and my powers, but my curse never got fulfilled!” His lower jaw flapped rapidly; Pacifica wondered how he was still capable of talking with it like that.

“...Yeah, well, looks like you got a lotta baggage to deal with, so I’m just gonna-” She quickly rushed over to the edge of the trees.

Unfortunately, every gap between the trunks was filled with sharp, vicious-looking brambles that it looked impossible to break through without tearing yourself to pieces in the process. She stamped her foot in annoyance.

“It’s all part o’ the spell,” Gideon lamented from behind her. She whirled and saw that while she wasn’t looking, at least he’d popped his jaw back into place. “Stanford Pines trapped me here cuz I was responsible for destroyin’ his home and his family, and I’ve been stuck in a kinda limbo. Neither alive nor dead.”

“Ugggghhhhh! I did _not_ ask for this!” Pacifica threw up her hands, having only half-listened to his whining. “I just didn’t want to lose the _one_ pretty thing I had left, and now I’m stuck in an inescapable trap with a rotting zombie boy-!”

“What pretty thing?!”

Pacifica gestured in irritation to where the amulet was lying on the grass.

Gideon squealed, and lunged for it, not appearing to care when one of his feet almost fell off in the process.

“ _Mineeeee!!!!_ ”

“Tuh, whatever. I don’t even care.” Pacifica sat down in the grass with a frustrated huff as she watched him snatch it up and greedily caress it between his pudgy fingers.

“At laaaaast,” he purred, in a voice that was becoming more unsteady by the second. He raised his fist into the air, and an eerie green light began to glow from it.

...And believe it or not, that’s when things _really_ got weird.

* * *

Namely, because from the beam of light that was produced there appeared a bright yellow figure, cackling wildly.

That sent a small chill down Pacifica’s spine, because...she remembered that laugh. Somewhere buried deep in her memory, she’d heard it before, probably on the day the sky turned red-

The laughing became louder and louder, before the one responsible for it fully manifested into existence: a bright yellow triangle wearing a tall black hat, and twirling a cane for some reason.

 **_“Oh_ ** **man** **_, real world it is_ ** **good** **_to be_ ** **back** **_!”_ ** he trilled. **_“I woulda been here sooner, except_ ** **someone** **_didn’t have the brains to realize what I was and set me free!”_ **

“Hey!”

But he ignored Pacifica and kept his one eye focused on the boy in front of him. **_“So, Gideon, you ready to get your revenge on the Pines family once and for all?”_ **

Gideon replied with a savage grin, “I can’t wait!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If nobody else wants to draw zombie!Gideon and his (not so) loyal sidekick, then I'll have to see if I can do it.
> 
> What can I say; the idea of Pacifica being the Bartok equivalent just tickled my fancy too much for me not to put it in.  
> Even if I made things very (perhaps unnecessarily) tragic for her.


	7. Journey to the Past, continued

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry, I know it's been a while since I added to this; I kind of lost my motivation for a hot minute. But never fear, I am BACK, baby!

“You hear that, Waddles?” May squealed excitedly. “We’re going to Gravity Falls!”

Stan looked like he wanted to object about the pig coming, but at last he just shrugged. “Sure, why not. He looks potentially delicious.”

It was almost comical how horrified both May and Waddles looked; she stood protectively in front of the pig, and gave the old man a stern glare. “Don’t even think about it! He’s my pet!”

“Try sayin’ that when we’ve been eating trail mix for a week,” Stan retorted. But then he just looked over at Soos and Wendy. “You knuckleheads ready ta go?”

“Well, um, I probably oughta go tell my grandma so she won’t be too worried about me,” Soos said with a bit of an awkward laugh.

Wendy shrugged, and pulled her pack onto her shoulder. “I’m ready when everyone else is.”

“Okay. Soos, meet us at the ship.”

“Aye aye, captain!” Soos saluted, and spun around to march out the door-and immediately slammed head first into the wall. He staggered back, shook his head a few times, and then went through the actual gaping doorway.

“So what’re the prince and princess’s real names?” May asked as the group wandered out of the ruined palace and began trekking through the woods.

“Mason and Mabel,” Stan answered, using the end of his cane to whack a vine that tried to wrap itself around his shoulder. It hissed at him as it receded into the underbrush.

May’s eyes widened. “Ooh, I like that name! Dipper, from now on you gotta call me Mabel!”

“What? We don’t even know for sure that that’s really us!”

“And your new name is Mason!” she said, ignoring his protests (situation normal). Then she frowned thoughtfully. “ _ Is _ it a new name, if it might actually be your old name and you just forgot it was your name?”

Dipper rolled his eyes. “I’m just gonna stick with Dipper, thanks.” He liked it a lot better than Mason, thank you very much.

“Fiiiiine, but from now on, everyone can call me MAB-ummph!”

“Kid, how about you not go around yelling out your name in places where monsters might hear you and show up ta rip the flesh from your bones, huh?” Stan asked.

The newly christened Mabel squirmed, but not even licking the old man’s hand was enough to make him take it away from her mouth until she nodded to show she understood.

“Atta girl.” Stan wiped her spit on his pants, and kept walking.

As they reached the edge of town, Stan pulled his scarf up to cover his mouth and nose.

“People around here don’t exactly love me,” he said when he saw the twins’ questioning glances. “I don’t get why-I mean, have you looked at this gorgeous mug? Why wouldn’t anyone love this?” Even with half his face covered Dipper could tell he was grinning at them.

“It’s probably because you once tried to sell them a bunch of lemons that you painted and called ‘mutant oranges,’” Wendy said dryly. “And then tricked Farmer Sprott into giving you his last one-headed chicken because it would protect the town from the ‘basilizard’ living in the sea next to your ship, and cooked and ate it instead. And then-”

“Okay, we get it!” Stan gave the back of her head a light swat. “Yeesh, just air out all my dirty laundry, why don’t you?”

Hardly anybody was on the streets of Glass Shard Beach, or if they were, it was just to move as quickly as possible from one falling-apart building to another. This meant that the little group walked through what felt like more or less a ghost town-though Dipper could feel the sensation of being watched by unseen eyes. It gave him the shivers.

May- _ Mabel _ , he was probably going to have to get used to calling her that, skipped along without any apparent concern and examining the wreckage with a kind of innocent curiosity (at one point stepping over a pair of legs lying under a crumbled building with the observation, “He’s resting”), but both Stan and Wendy were wary; Wendy had pulled the hatchet out of her belt, and Stan was gripping his cane as his eyes darted back and forth. Dipper decided to follow their example, and kept his hand on his knife as they made their way down to the beach.

When Stan said “ship,” Dipper didn’t expect it to be an old, broken wreck that was lying right on the shore (probably explained why the old man smelled like seawater). He also hadn’t realized that the sound of the waves would be quite so... _ loud _ , once they were inside.

As far back as he could remember, Dipper had been uncomfortable in large bodies of water, or around them, or even being able to hear them. This meant it had been a chore to get him to bathe back at the orphanage, to the point where Mr. Poolcheck had threatened to hogtie him if he didn’t cooperate more than once.

He couldn’t help it; being in water always made him feel...panicked inside, and brought back faint memories of...something. Memories of tumbling over and over, barely getting to breathe, and hearing his voice and his sister’s screaming in terror.

Just the sound of waves crashing against the back of the ship was starting to make Dipper’s hands sweat even more than usual, and his heart thump wildly in his ears.

A warm hand on his shoulder startled him into looking up.

“Dude, are you okay?” Wendy asked. From this angle he couldn’t help noticing how long and red her hair was, and that her smile was actually kind of nice-

Dipper realized he was staring at her like an idiot, and coughed awkwardly. “Yeah! Yeah, I’m-I’m fine. Just-nothing.”

“You sure? You looked a little pale there.”

“Yeah, I’m okay now.” Dipper looked away from Wendy-and saw in mortification the grin on Mabel’s face.

He decided now was a good time to go check out the other side of the ship.

Stan had gone to what looked like several different piles of junk, and produced several odds and ends that he shoved together into a bag.

“Okay, as soon as Soos gets here we’re gonna go in the woods and grab a bear.”

Dipper blinked, not sure if he’d heard that right. “...A what?”

“Somethin’ wrong with your hearing, Dip? I said a  _ bear _ .”

“As in...one of those big brown furry creatures with fangs and claws that’s been known to tear people in half?”

“Yup, that’s the one!” Stan said, far too cheerfully. “I’ve been trainin’ him ta take me places, he’s gonna be our ride to Gravity Falls!”

He pulled his scarf up again and started for the exit of the ship; the children hurried after him.

“How-” Dipper struggled to figure out which question he wanted to ask first. He settled with, “How is a bear going to take us to Gravity Falls? Is it big enough for us to all ride, or is it gonna ride at the front of a bicycle built for six, or-”

Stan scoffed.

“Nah, everyone’s seen a bicycle-riding bear! No, I taught this bear-”

His eyes lit up with a manic light.

“To  _ drive a carriage _ !”

* * *

“...So anyway we gotta get these kids back to their family, which they think is somewhere in Gravity Falls, and who might be the king o’ New Jersey,” Soos finished explaining. He looked a little guilty. “...But I don’t wanna leave you here alone, Abuelita, if you need me ta stay and look after you.”

The red plush armchair in front of him gave as much of an understanding nod as she was capable without a chin, or any head to speak of. “You’re such a good boy,  _ mijo _ . But I will be fine; go help your friends.”

“You sure? I don’t want you gettin’ turned ta stone by eye-bats or anything.”

His abuela gave him one of her calm smiles. “They will not target me, Soos, because I am a chair now. I will be fine, you will see.”

Soos smiled, and hugged his grandmother. “I’ll come back to you, I promise.” He smooched her upholstery and hurried back out of the house.

Once he was gone, the armchair recliner opened out, and the chair stretched as far back as it could go.

“...Time for a nap,” she sighed contentedly. It was a dangerous world right now, had been for the past six years, but she had every confidence in her grandson coming back in one piece. He was a man now.

In a way.


	8. That's what I hate about this new country: everything's in red

“...And when you hear people yelling stuff like “Stop! Stop!” or “Pull over you maniac!” that means speed up,” Stan said as he tucked his arms behind his head and rested his ankle on his opposite knee.

The bear growled, but then lifted its paws and smacked the reins, urging the horses on. If one of them started to slow down it would snarl, and they’d speed up again in terrified submission.

Dipper definitely still had reservations about this whole situation, but so far there didn’t appear to be any better alternatives, so he just leaned against the window of the rattling carriage and resigned himself to this being their way of reaching Gravity Falls.

Mabel had wanted to sit up front with Stan and the bear, but Waddles refused to get close to it so they were sitting next to Dipper inside, with Wendy and Soos on the seats across from them and everyone’s luggage (such as it was) sitting at their feet.

* * *

For a few minutes there was just awkward-feeling silence aside from the rattling of carriage wheels on the road, until at last Soos coughed.

“So. You kids grew up in an orphanage. What was that like?”

“It sucked,” Dipper said bluntly; at the same time Mabel’s brighter tone said, “We learned a lot about discipline and hard work!”

“Ugh, no wonder you guys left,” Wendy said without looking up from her penny dreadful,  _ Avoiding Eye Contact Monthly _ .

“Not-not exactly. We weren’t given a choice. Mr. Poolcheck kicked us out to get a job.”

“But instead we decided we were gonna go to Gravity Falls!” Mabel grinned, and bounced in her seat.

“Truly, it is an inspiring tale,” Soos said with a solemn nod.

“How about you two?” Mabel asked. “How’d you guys wind up working for a cranky, weird, gross old man?”

Soos looked offended on his employer’s behalf. “Mr. Boss is  _ not _ gross!”

Wendy smothered a laugh into her booklet, and the kids had to stifle their own mirth. Soos just went on, apparently oblivious, “I was exploring the beach one day and went to check out the ship, because I thought it was abandoned, but psych, it turned out to be not abandoned cuz he and Wendy were there, and Mr. Boss asked if I knew howta fix stuff like this carriage, and gave me a job! It was great!”

“Awwwww, that’s so sweet!” Mabel beamed. She looked up at the older girl. “What about you, Wendy?”

Wendy shrugged. “Basically the same thing. It’s not like I had anything else to do with my time, so I decided I’d stick around and do stuff for the old codger.”

“Your family wasn’t worried about that?” From what he knew about families, Dipper was sure most of them would be kind of uncomfortable about an old man keeping a young girl around to work for him; he wasn’t getting that kind of vibe or anything from them (gross), but still.

To his surprise, Wendy’s hands tightened around the edges of her booklet. After a second she whispered, “No. They’re not worried.”

Something about the very definite way in which she said that made Dipper shut up and look out the window.

_ Could we really be the Pines twins? _ he wondered to himself.

Soos had a point that it was unlikely there were many other sets of twins out there who would be just the right age and looked as much like the painting as they did...but it still felt like such a fantastic thing to believe.

Stories about long-lost princesses and princes who were able to discover their identities and reclaim the throne were just something that happened in stories, they weren’t real life. There was no way he and Mabel could be that lucky.

Huh. It was becoming easier for him to think of her as ‘Mabel,’ instead of ‘May,’ like she’d been for the past six years.

* * *

Speak of the devil, Dipper suddenly realized that Mabel was trying to get his attention.

“Huh?”

“Do you wanna play a game with us? We’re playing I Spy.” She peered out the window with a thoughtful frown. “I spy...with my little eye...something...green.”

“A tree,” Dipper deadpanned.

“Dude, it was my turn!” Soos protested.

“Oh. Sorry.” It would’ve been nice if they’d mentioned to him that they were taking turns, but during games Mabel tended to forget about things like that. Or conveniently forgot to mention it, it was hard to tell with her sometimes.

Soos stroked his chin like he was trying to look extra thoughtful. “I’m gonna go with...a tree.”

“Yay, Soos got it!”

Mabel high-fived him.

“Technically I got it first,” Dipper protested.

“Yeah, but it wasn’t your turn!”

“That’s not the-oh, forget it.” He folded his arms with a sigh, and leaned back in his chair.

“Soos’s turn to spy!”

Soos squinted out the window.

“Hmm...I spy, with my little eye…” he squinted his eye as tightly shut as he could while still allowing himself to see, “something...brown and green.”

Mabel frowned in thought. “Hmm...brown and green, brown and green…a turtle?”

“Nope, sorry, hambone!”

“Aw, man…” She gave a disappointed sigh.

“Is it my turn now?” Dipper asked.

“No, it’s Waddles’s turn.” She looked down at the pig, who grunted a couple of times.

Mabel gasped. “Aaagh, he said Mabel! ...Either that, or ‘corncob.’” She leaned closer to Waddles. “Which was it, Mabel or ‘corncob’?”

Waddles grunted again.

She squealed. “He said Mabel!”

Unseen by her, Dipper rolled his eyes to the heavens.

“No, sorry dude, but it’s not Mabel either,” Soos addressed the pig.

“ _ Now _ is it my turn?” Dipper asked.

“Yes, okay.”

“Is it another tree?”

Soos gasped. “Whoa, are you psychic or something?”

“No, it was just a lucky guess.”

“Dipper’s turn to guess!”

He gave up trying to understand the turn-system that had been established, and just looked out the window.

“I spy, with my little eye…” He blinked. “Something red and pointy?”

“Hmm…” Soos peered out the window, “That’s a tricky one.”

The phrase, however, had caught Mabel’s attention. “Wait, what?”

But by then the carriage had rounded a bend in the road and it had disappeared.

For the first time in a while Mabel’s cheeriness faded; she peered anxiously over Dipper’s shoulder.

“You’re kidding, right Dipper?”

“I wish I was, but I’m pretty sure I saw one.”

“UGGGHHH!!!!!!!!!!!” Mabel pulled up the collar of her sweater over her face.

Soos’s eyes flicked between the twins. “...Either of you feel like filling me in?”

“I think I saw one of  _ these _ creeps.” Dipper grabbed his journal and flipped to the right section, which had a picture of a tiny man with a tall, pointy hat.

Wendy put down her booklet.

“Oh, ugh, gnomes.”

“Yeah, we had to deal with them around the orphanage sometimes, cuz they kept getting in the trash.”

“And last time they actually wanted me to run away and become their queen.” Mabel lifted her head from the sweater enough for them to see how disgusted she was. “As if!”

“Long story short, the gnomes have a kind of vendetta against us for punching a bunch of them in the face, and drop-kicking others over the fence, and whacking a few more with a frying pan, and said if they ever catch us in their territory we’ll be sorry.” Dipper glanced out nervously at the trees. “I’m guessing this is probably a branch of it.”

“...Maybe if we’re lucky they didn’t recognize us,” Mabel said.

Just then Stan let out a startled noise from outside, and the carriage screeched to a halt, as an entire  _ army _ of tiny red-hatted men began springing out of the underbrush, appearing in the trees, and (presumably) stepping onto the path in front of and behind them.

Dipper groaned. “News flash, Mabel: we’re not lucky.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, I know, it's a cliffhanger.  
> It's what I do.
> 
> Don't worry, I'm not implying any kind of non-platonic relationship between Stan and Wendy. Ew.


	9. Attack of the gnomes

Ugh. Gnomes. Just what Stan  _ didn’t _ need in his life right now. Especially since they had that twerp James-no, Jordan-Jethro- _ Jeff _ , yeah that was the leader’s name-at the head of the pack.

Stan leaned over and grabbed the reins, pulling the horses to a stop; the bear growled at him, but he just growled back. It sat back and leaned its paws on its knees in a way that seemed almost sulky, but was at least submissive, allowing him to turn back to the gnomes.

“There a problem here, short stack?” he addressed the one leading the pack, without pulling the scarf away from his face.

The tiny man drew himself up (not overly impressive, considering) with a dark glare. “Yes, there’s a problem, human! We got a reliable tip that you’ve got two people in your carriage who’re at the top of our most wanted list, and you’ve got ten seconds to surrender them!”

Despite the kind of trouble they could get into when left unattended (or even when doing his bidding, let’s be honest), Stan doubted he was talking about Soos and Wendy.

_ What the heck do they  _ teach _ kids in those orphanages? _

It took him a moment to realize that the lead gnome was waiting for an answer.

“Ya mind givin’ me a few more details than that?” He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees and tilting his head in mock curiosity.

Jeff grumbled, and clenched his tiny hands into fists. “Well, if you  _ must _ know, we wanted the prettier one to marry all one thousand of us and become our gnome queen for all eternity, and she turned us down! And then, when we tried to assert our right to have a queen by kidnapping her, she and her brother attacked us! They made so many of us puke rainbows that it’s not even funny anymore, and they drop-kicked Shmebulock over a fence!”

“Shmebulock!” an older, grizzled-looking gnome agreed.

“Yeah, what...ever he said.” Jeff stepped up onto the heads of the two gnomes right in front of him, and folded his arms. “So, are you gonna hand ‘em over to face gnomish justice, or are we gonna have to get  _ tough _ ?”

...Even if these kids weren’t actually his family, there was  _ no way _ he was forcing either of them into an underage marriage.

“...Yeah, I’m not doin’ that.” With that he thrust the reins back into the bear’s paws.

“Let’s go, honeypants!”

With a blood-chilling roar, the bear smacked the reins. The horses reared, flailing their hooves, and then charged forwards at top speed, sending gnomes fleeing in all directions to avoid being trampled or crushed. Stan got to his feet as best he could, using one hand to grab onto the top of the carriage so he could keep his balance, while he swung his cane with the other, smacking any of the little beggars that came flying at him or the bear.

“So long, SUCKERS!” he yelled over his shoulder-

And then he muttered a few less repeatable phrases, when he saw that they had already started stacking up on top of each other to form a giant gnome monster.

He hoped the kids were comfortable, because this was gonna be a bumpy ride.

* * *

“AAAAAUUUUGGGGGHHHH!!!!!”

A chorus of screams resounded through the inside of the carriage, as the four children (Soos may have been older than all of them, but he still counted as a child in personality) bounced off the seats, the walls and each other in the least comfortable way possible. Dipper tried to grab onto the windowsill, only to have it wrenched out of his grasp when one of the wheels went over an extremely big rock, so instead he accidentally head-butted Wendy in the gut.

“Sorry!” he managed to gasp out, seconds before having the wind knocked out of him by colliding with Mabel.

“What’s-going-on?!” Soos wailed, flailing his big arms as he landed on the floor and somehow wound up squashed between the seats and the luggage.

Before anyone could answer, they heard a deafening roar, and a few seconds later ten gnomes at once came flying through the window, grabbing onto Mabel and Dipper.

“You’re coming with us, crimin-aagh!” The speaker was abruptly cut off by the toe of Wendy’s boot sending him tumbling back out the window.

The tall redhead pulled herself up to her full height (as best she could considering how much they were still being shaken and tossed about), pushing her hair back over her shoulders, and snatched her axe from her belt. Her eyes glittered darkly.

“You want these kids, you’re gonna have to try harder than that.”

Dipper’s pupils widened to twice their size, even as he punched a gnome off of him. “Wendy, you are like the coolest person I have ever met.”

“I know, dude.”

All was chaos.

No matter how many gnomes they fought off, more kept coming; they were swarming up the sides of the carriage, gnawing on the wheels, even jumping on the horses (which was definitely not doing the terrified animals any favors). And all the time the giant gnome came closer and closer, close enough to swipe at them with its claws, and make the ground shake enough to throw them even more off balance. The carriage plunged off the path, plowing through bushes and barely avoiding crashing into trees as it lunged hither and thither, before barrelling on screeching wheels up the side of a rocky ridge in such a precarious way that they’d be lucky if they weren’t sent plunging to their deaths any second.

At that point the bear finally appeared to decide that it had had enough, and it leaped off onto the side of the ridge.

“TRAITOR!” Stan yelled after it, shaking his fist; then he tried and failed to grab for the reins, and decided it wasn’t worth risking smashing his hand.

Stan wished fervently that he had that wind-creating device Poindexter had invented; it had always done wonders for scaring off gnomes, in addition to being great for blowing away leaves. Here and now, though, he had to make do with his fists and his cane.

One of the giant gnome’s “claws” dug briefly into the top of the carriage, ripping it clean off; the action was accompanied by a near-deafening, high-pitched screech.

“Dipper, stop screeching!” Stan ordered, loud enough that the kid actually obeyed.

“Mr. Boss, what do we  _ do _ ?!” Soos asked, bashing another gnome on the head with a meaty fist and then chucking it out the window. “We can’t keep fighting them forever!”

“Speak for yourself!” Wendy retorted, grabbing two at once and smacking their heads together.

But for once, Stan knew that Soos was right. Sooner or later they were going to start getting too tired to fight back, and then they would be, in a word, screwed.

Unless…

He looked around, realizing that they’d temporarily gotten far enough ahead that there were no gnomes actually inside the carriage, and that up ahead of them there was a big boulder that the horses were going to have to go around.

“When we reach that spot,” he said, pointing to it, “we’re gonna jump.”

“Uh, sorry, I don’t think I heard you right,” Wendy said after a second. “It sounded like you said-”

“Yeah, I did.” Without even turning his head Stan backhanded a final gnome out of the window.

“Okay, boss, did you get hit on the head or something-”

“No! We’re gonna jump ta safety in the trees, and hopefully we’ll have time ta get away before they realize we’re out!” He jumped all the way into the carriage, and began rummaging around in their luggage. “We just gotta get a rope or somethin-”

An old, but still in good condition, grappling hook was thrust under his nose by a tiny twelve-year-old hand.

Stan’s eyes widened, and his heart did something funny in his chest that he hoped wasn’t an indication that he was having an attack.

“...That’ll work.”

There wasn’t much time for them to do anything else; seconds later the carriage was skidding around the boulder on two wheels, and, grabbing onto each other and as much stuff as they could, Stan took aim at the closest trees, and fired.

It must have been the strongest grappling hook in the world, because it was able to pull all of them out at once, and a few seconds later Stan was spitting out a mouthful of leaves and hoping that his nose hadn’t just been broken again.

He could feel the kids’ hands gripping his arms, and Soos clutching his shoulder; a cursory glance behind him as he managed to set his feet on a branch beneath them confirmed that yes, Wendy and even the pig were there too, looking relatively unscathed aside from some bruising and scratching.

He maneuvered until they were all able to find a safe place to sit or stand, and gripped onto the tree as they felt the rumble of the giant gnome storming past, still in pursuit of the carriage. For the time being, at least, they were safe from them.

“...Ugh, I  _ hate _ gnomes,” Mabel muttered once things were quiet.

“I’m not having really warm and fuzzy feelings about carriages right now, either,” Dipper groaned; Stan noticed that he’d turned a little green, and hoped he wasn’t about to puke.

“Yeah, I’m with both you dudes,” Soos said with a nod.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, it's a little out there for Mabel's grappling hook to be strong enough to lift five people (and a pig) at once.  
> I mean, I can believe everything else about this story, but that's just SILLY.  
> Let's say just for argument's sake that it's made out of some very durable material, and leave it at that, okay?


	10. Meanwhile, back in Billeon's limbo

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> After two days of travel from the deserts of Arizona to the slightly more humid deserts of Texas, and one mostly sleepless night in between them spent at a truck stop, my internal clock is officially even more messed up than before, because after I finished bringing stuff to my room for the day I had no motivation to do anything besides take a shower and then go to bed for what was probably ten hours. However, I am now awake enough to at least post a fresh chapter to this story. So be grateful.

After a few seconds the orb of light which had been showing the clearing what was going on faded away; it was quickly followed by an enraged squeal, before a ball of bright blue fire was hurled at one of the trees; as soon as it made contact it was absorbed into the bark, and swiftly vanished.

Pacifica looked up from using a thorn she’d broken off one of the brambles to clean her nails, and rolled her eyes.

“Were you this much of a drama queen when you were still alive?” she asked Gideon (she assumed that’s who he was right now; his eyes weren’t glowing anymore, and whenever they were that meant he was the other one).

He didn’t seem to hear her; he just screeched again, before pulling out two clumps of his hair-along with what looked like a little bit of skin, ewww.

“Seriously?!” Gideon demanded, “They had one job! ‘Destroy the Pines family’-how hard was that?!” Then he tilted his head, and admitted with a creepy smile, “O’ course, the girl  _ has _ grown up into a pretty fine-lookin’ filly-if she weren’t a spawn o’ the Pines family I wouldn’t wanna destroy her either.”

Personally, Pacifica was more interested in the boy; he was a lot more attractive than she remembered, even if he really needed someone to teach him better taste in clothes. But she pushed the thought aside and started using the side of the thorn to attempt to file her nails.

Gideon was still ranting as he marched in her direction.

“...stupid gnomes, shoulda known they couldn’t handle the job, now what am I supposed to do, blah blah blah blah blah…”

Pacifica might have not been paying strict attention to what he was saying during the last part, but you get the gist.

As he waved his chubby little arms around, his hand broke off again, and landed right on her leg.

“Ugh! What have I told you?! Keep your gross rotting limbs  _ off _ me!” Pacifica snatched up the hand and threw it-and the jewel which had been clutched in it slipped free, hurling right towards one of the trees that surrounded this clearing.

“YOU IDIOT!”

Showing way more panic than Pacifica had ever expected him to have, Gideon lunged after the jewel; his other arm popped right off, barely staying attached by some kind of muscles or sinews or whatever, and stretched out just enough for the pendant to land in his outstretched hand.

Gideon quickly pulled his arm back to him, and let out a small sigh of relief as he hugged the pendant to his chest. Then he turned a rage-filled gaze on Pacifica.

“I sold mah soul ta Bill for this.” He clenched his fist, and a creepy blue-green light began to glow around it. Seconds later Pacifica found herself being lifted into the air.

“Whoa-hey!”

_ Not again! _

Gideon was still talking, as he leaned down and reattached his other hand. “Both my life and his anchor to this world depend on its existence and safety! And  _ you _ -” it had been a long time since she’d been addressed with that much venom- “just nearly destroyed it by throwin’ it at the magical barrier keepin’ us in here!”

“Agh! I didn’t know, okay?! Just chill out!” She tried to get away, without success.

Gideon gestured with his hand, and Pacifica was lowered until they were nose to nose. “See that you remember it, you miserable little girl.”

Just for a second, his eyes turned yellow, and the other one was staring back at her. Then she was being dropped to the ground, and Gideon or Bill or whatever turned away.

* * *

For a second all Pacifica could do was lie on the ground and try to calm her racing heart. She  _ hated _ it when the other guy was in charge, but this was the first time he had seemed to really notice her.

She didn’t like the idea of him knowing she was there.

She didn’t like the idea that maybe he knew who she was.

“This just keeps getting better and better,” she whispered to herself as she sat up at last, pushing her hair out of her face.

She jumped when Gideon abruptly whirled around. “What are you muttering about?!”

Pacifica checked his eyes-and relaxed a little when she saw they were just bloodshot and murky and gross-looking; at least there was no more yellow. This one was less creepy, and maybe easier to handle.

“Uh, just-just thinking maybe you could let  _ me  _ go take care of the Pines family for you. I’d be better than the gnomes, and I’d probably be the last person they’d expect.”

Of course, all she planned to do was run as far away from here as she could get, but there was no need to tell him that.

Gideon smiled wide, and she had a nasty feeling that he knew perfectly well what she’d been thinking.

“Oh, trust me, darlin’, I got a  _ much _ better plan in mind for them now. Somethin’ really, truly...cruel.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tee hee, writing these two working together is giving me such Drakken and Shego vibes. Sort of.


	11. Learn to do it

“So what now?” Dipper asked as they finally reached the bottom of the tree (Stan was the last one down, and he took  _ forever _ ; he claimed that he was just trying to see if there was anything in the forest surrounding them, but Dipper suspected that he was secretly afraid of heights and didn’t want to admit it). “Are we gonna just  _ walk _ to Gravity Falls?”

“Unless you got a better idea,” Stan retorted as he picked up one of the bags and began digging through it.

“I could be your arm throne, dude!” Soos suggested, kneeling and holding out his arms in kind of a weird pose. “Arm throooone!”

“No thanks, Soos.” Dipper resumed interrogating Stan. “How long is  _ that _ gonna take?”

“A lot longer if you’re gonna stand there gabbling. Now get your stuff.”

Dipper grumbled, but he grabbed his bag (which was mostly just spare clothes Soos and Wendy were lending him), and slung it over his shoulder.

Stan finally pulled whatever he was looking for out of the bag; Dipper saw that it was a compass.

“Which way is Gravity Falls compared to north?” he asked.

Stan shrugged without looking up from the little needle. “Heck if I know.”

“...Then how is a compass gonna help us find it?”

“Cuz it doesn’t point north. It points to where you really wanna go.” Stan grinned at him. “It was a gift from a friend.”

Dipper suspected, from what he’d seen of the old man so far, that that actually meant he’d stolen it. He was also pretty sure that there was no way Stan would ever admit it if he asked. So, with a resigned sigh, he got ready to start walking again.

* * *

“Mr. Boss, are we really gonna get to meet Fiddleford McGucket?” Soos asked sometime later, as they were walking through the forest. His eyes brightened at the idea.

Both twins looked up at him in confusion. “Who?” They didn’t notice the way that Stan’s back stiffened, or hear him mutter a soft “oh crap.”

“He’s like this crazy genius inventor guy!” Wendy said, for once losing her stoic outer shell and looking as excited as Soos. “He’s built all these cool robots that he uses to fight off monsters, but he’s also kinda crazy, so sometimes they go rogue and turn against their maker instead!”

“He’s the king’s best friend, and Mr. Boss says we’re gonna meet him first when we get to Gravity Falls!”

Dipper whipped his head back towards Stan. “...I thought we’d want to meet the king first. What’s so important about this McGucket guy?”

Stan glanced over his shoulder a little, and Dipper could see him biting his lip in a way that seemed kind of nervous. His eyes narrowed.

Mabel caught on to her brother’s suspicions, and circled around to walk on Stan’s other side. “Yeah, why’s this robot guy so special?”

Stan grumbled, before admitting, “...McGucket’s the only one who knows where he is anymore.”

“Ta make a long story short, after the day the sky turned red the king’s kinda gone inta seclusion somewhere in Gravity Falls. Nobody’s seen him in years besides McGucket, and I figure the only way anyone’s gonna  _ get  _ ta see him is if they can convince old possum-breath that they’re bringing him the long-lost members of his family.”

Dipper screeched to a halt. “Wait a second. Wait, wait wait wait. You mean we’re gonna have to  _ prove _ to someone that we’re the Pines twins?!”

“Hey, I didn’t say that exactly-” Stan started to say.

“We don’t even  _ know _ that that’s who we are!” Dipper ranted, marching back and forth and waving his arms. “So that means we’d be-we’d be technically lying to royalty! Is that even  _ legal _ ?!”

Stan leaned on his cane with a tired sigh. “Kid, there’s no cops anymore. Pretty much  _ everything’s _ legal. And c’mon, we also don’t know that you’re  _ not _ the Pines twins; chill out.”

“Yeah, good luck telling him that,” Mabel said, “He’s got like a zero chill factor.”

Dipper glared at her. “This is not a  _ joke _ , Mabel! There’s no way anyone’s gonna believe that we’re the lost prince and princess-I mean,  _ look _ at us! We’re a pair of skinny little nobodies!”

“Hey, speak for yourself!” Mabel put her hands on her hips.

Just as Dipper was about to start pacing again, he was drawn up short by Stan’s big hand grabbing his shoulder. “Dipper. Listen to me. It ain’t the best scenario ever, if it were up to me we’d just go right ta the king and have him decide for himself if you’re really his niece and nephew. But we gotta jump through a couple hoops first, cuz he’s hidden so well I don’t think even I could find him on my own.” He gave Dipper’s shoulder an awkward pat. “...Besides, what other choice have you and your sister got? Just wander off somewhere and try fendin’ for yourselves till you get eaten by something?”

“Yeah, dude,” Wendy chimed in. “Your best chance is in Gravity Falls.”

Dipper glanced at Mabel uncertainly; she smiled at him, and shrugged a little. He reminded himself that even though sometimes her judgment over whether a situation was dangerous or not was a little screwed up, she was pretty good at judging people (except when her feelings were clouded by boy-craziness, of course). And she seemed comfortable enough with this little group and their plans.

He let out a long, slow breath.

“Okay. We’ll keep going.”

Stan grinned, and noogied him. “Atta boy.”

* * *

When everyone was tired, they stopped to set up camp for the night.

Stan ordered Dipper to chop wood for the fire while Wendy set up some protective spells to ward off monsters; he handed the boy Wendy’s axe, and a big block of wood to start with.

“What?!” Dipper complained. “You gotta be kidding me, this thing is huge!”

“Better start now, then.” Stan folded his arms, unmoved.

Dipper grumbled wordlessly, but then rolled up his sleeves and started trying to cut up the log.

“Why are you making me do this?” he couldn’t help asking. “Have you seen my weak noodle arms?” He waved them to make his point.

“Kid, if I can learn ta do it, you can learn ta do it. It’ll toughen you up a little.”

“More like it’ll give me blisters the size of-” Dipper swung the axe again, ignoring the way his arms screamed, and the final blow was enough to split it down the middle.

Dipper gaped at it in amazement. “I-I did it!”

Then he saw the way the old man was smirking at him, and blushed. “...Shut up.”

Once the fire was burning, Soos unrolled their one sleeping bag until it was stretched out like a kind of long mattress, so they all (even the pig, at Mabel’s insistence) could lie on it.

The little group shared a bag of dried meat for their supper, and then stretched out to sleep (except for Soos, who Stan ordered to take first watch).

“What was our family like, Stan?” Mabel asked once she was comfortable (which didn’t take too long, despite their sleeping on the forest floor; honestly the beds back at the orphanage had been much worse).

Stan opened his eyes sleepily. “Hmm?”

“Did we have parents?” Unlike her brother, she seemed to have fully embraced the idea that they were long-lost royalty.

“Not just parents,” Stan said, folding his arms behind his head. “You had grandparents. And they were all really good people, who didn’t deserve what happened to ‘em.”

“What were their names?”

Stan closed his eyes. “Your granddad was Shermie, and his wife’s name was Rebecca. And a lotta people joked that she was the  _ real  _ power behind the throne, cuz she made decisions about laws and stuff just as much as he did. They had a kid named Alexander, and he ended up marrying this chick named Anastasia. It started out as just an alliance-type marriage, but they really ended up fallin’ in love with each other.”

“Awwww,” Mabel crooned happily, leaning her elbows on the ground and nestling her chin in her hands with a pleased smile. Then she tilted her head. “So what about our uncle, the one who’s king now?”

Stan stared at the fire for a moment. At last he said, “Don’t remember what his name is, but from what I heard, you’re really gonna like him. He’s a major nerd like Dipper-”

“Hey!”

Stan just gave the boy a flat look that dared him to deny the description, until he looked away sulkily. “-and he’s really big on exploring and chasing down weird stuff. If there’s anyone who’d be impressed with two kids who punched out a bunch o’ gnomes, it’s him.”

“Hey, wasn’t there a third brother?”

Stan jumped, and his gaze darted over to Soos.

He just tilted his head like a curious puppy. “Abuelita used to do work around the palace sometimes, and she said there were three Pines brothers.”

Stan’s face twitched. “Eh, the third one doesn’t matter. He was a total loser.”

And he lay back down and wrapped his coat around himself, effectively ending the conversation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, I'm using an idea from Pirates of the Caribbean. The first movie was good, okay; don't judge me.


	12. Learn to do it (reprise)

After what felt like only a few minutes Soos woke Dipper up, because apparently Stan had said to have him take the next watch. The boy sat up, grumbling, and rubbed some of the sleep out of his eyes.

“Why’d Stan have to decide _I_ was the one who needed toughening up? Why couldn’t he toughen up _Mabel_?”

Soos hummed thoughtfully as he lay down in Dipper’s spot. “My guess is either an outdated sense of chauvinism, or you need it more than she does.”

“...Thanks a lot, Soos.”

“No problem, dude!” Within a minute Soos was snoozing peacefully.

Dipper sighed and opened his journal, where he started writing about everything that had happened.

Every once in a while he’d look up to make sure they weren’t being watched or snuck up on by something, but for the most part he was able to write in peace. He added in a little sketch of everyone curled up together-somehow both Mabel and the pig had managed to scoot around until they were pressed up against Stan’s back, and it was pretty adorable-and finished off by writing the question, _Who knows what other adventures are waiting to be discovered on our way to Gravity Falls?_

By now Dipper was feeling pretty awake, so he ended up absentmindedly flipping back to his oldest entries in the journal. By now they had become smudged and torn-up, and the edges of the pages were crumpled and curled from the number of times he’d turned them. Dipper snickered and rolled his eyes at himself when he read over some of the things six-year-old him had written, to say nothing of his less-than-impressive artistic skills. That picture of the giant head with an arm attached to it that had come by the orphanage one day trying to get someone to climb into his mouth...ugh, it was a cringe-worthy drawing. Not just because he’d felt the need to give the giant hand six fingers for some reason.

Come to think of it, a lot of the hands he’d drawn back then seemed to have an extra finger attached. Weird little habit, he guessed.

He’d also spent a ridiculous amount of time drawing goldfish, Dipper thought with a small laugh. At least he had to assume they were goldfish, since they didn’t have eyes or fins or anything-just a wide-open mouth and a tail. At least his artistic skills had gotten better since then.

He nearly jumped out of his skin when a gravelly voice whispered from directly behind him, “Whatcha readin’ there, slick?”

Dipper whirled gracelessly around, yelping and somehow managing to shut the journal and shove it into his vest in as fluid a motion as possible. Somehow the noise wasn’t enough to wake everyone else up.

Stan put a finger to his lips and shushed him-the action losing some of its effect due to the enormous smirk he was wearing over having successfully scared him again.

“Ssh, everyone else’s tryna sleep.”

“You’re the one who scared me!” Dipper protested as he pressed a hand to his chest; he could feel his heart tap-dancing wildly.

“I just figured you needed the little reminder that you were _supposed_ ta be our look-out and make sure nothing comes and tries ta murder us in our sleep.”

The boy’s face flushed. “Oh shoot. You-you’re right, I-I’ve been looking up on and off, but-I’m sorry, I should’ve-”

“Go get some sleep, shortstack. You’re babbling.” Stan gestured to the sleeping bag, and Dipper crawled over to curl up next to Mabel.

Stan waited until he was sure Dipper was asleep before he dropped the squashed remains of the fairy whose chewing on his shoulder had woken him up into the fire.

* * *

For the next few days the little group traveled through the woods, following the path indicated by Stan’s compass.

They’d gather fruits or hunt for food (Wendy was the most useful in this area, since she’d basically grown up in the forest even before the sky turned red), and despite Stan’s dark suggestions they never went hungry enough to need to eat Waddles.

When one of the kids got tired Soos was more than happy to offer a piggyback ride; Mabel was usually more willing to accept the offer than Dipper was, but there were times when even he would get so tired that he wouldn’t protest being scooped into the big man’s arms for a while.

Whenever they stopped to sleep, Mabel would ask Stan to tell them more stories about the Pines family, and sit curled up with Waddles at her side while she listened to them. He’d tell them stories from history about how they first became the rulers of New Jersey, and simpler tales about the crazy antics of King Sherman and his two brothers, and even about the big festival that occurred on the day that the Pines Twins were born.

Dipper couldn’t help wondering how this grumpy old man knew so much about the Pines family, but whenever he tried to ask about it Stan would somehow manage to change the subject. But he had a sneaking suspicion that Soos and Wendy’s boss was hiding something.

And then, one day, as they were climbing up a hill, he was startled to realize that he could hear a roaring, rushing sound on the other side of it.

A very familiar one that made Dipper’s palms sweat even more than usual, and his heart leap up into his throat.

_Please let that be just some kind of giant monster that we’re gonna have to fight to the death, please don’t let it be-_

It was an enormous, winding river.

_Of course it is. Because life hates me._

Stan leaned on his cane and tilted his head from one side to the other, examining the river, before whirling around to face the group. “Welcome, ladies and gentlemen-and Dipper-”

Dipper was too busy trying not to panic to pay attention to the dig; Stan looked disappointed (and maybe it was his imagination, but he even seemed a tad concerned) at his lack of reaction, but then went on with his spiel.

“-to the Ohemgee River! Just another milestone on our journey to Gravity Falls!”

“...Why’s it called the-” Mabel began; seconds later, a large, sharp-toothed eel lunged partly out of the water, letting out a blood-chilling screech, and then disappeared back below the surface.

“OMG!” she screamed, hiding behind Stan.

He ruffled her hair with a playful smile. “That’s why.”

“Wh-wh-what was that?!” Dipper managed to stutter out.

“It’s a shrieking eel. Nasty little ba-” Stan checked himself- “beggars. They always make that kinda noise when they’re hunting. Especially when they think they’re about ta eat human flesh.”

“...And you’re gonna make us cross it, aren’t you?” Wendy asked resignedly.

“You betcha!” Stan twirled his cane, and then began making his way down the hill. “But I guess we can try gettin’ some sleep on this side of the bank first.”

“Gee, you’re so generous, boss.”

“It’s one of my best qualities, red.”

* * *

“Hurry up…” Gideon muttered impatiently as he watched the little group set up camp on the riverbank, and the tall redheaded girl dared the gopher man into going in the water to try and catch some fish for dinner without getting eaten by eels. “Hurry up and go ta sleep already, Pineses!”

Pacifica looked up from the flowers that she was trying to weave into a necklace, raising one blonde eyebrow. “What’re you gonna try and do now?”

Gideon grinned, and rested his chubby rotting hands on either side of the orb. “I think it’s about time I sent a little friend in to meet the Pines family. Someone who can get inside their minds...where there’s no escape for ‘em…”

His eyes glowed with an unearthly yellow light.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Cue en masse facepalm from readers over the lost chance for Stan to get another clue about these kids really being his niece and nephew*
> 
> ...Am I right, or am I right?


	13. Dreamscapes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I realized that I've made a terrible mistake.  
> I had the perfect name for this story, and I didn't use it.  
> It should have been...  
> (Drumroll...)  
> ...Stanastasia!!
> 
> *Crickets*
> 
> (Squidward voice) Everyone's a critic.

At first Dipper tried sleeping with his back to the river.

But he could still hear it roaring, and chilling mental images of it climbing up the bank and crashing down over him kept rushing across his brain.

He tried lying on his other side, so he could watch the river and make sure that didn’t happen.

But that was even more stressful, because when he opened his eyes it meant it was the first thing he saw, and the raw terror this created jolted him wide awake again.

Finally he was forced to compromise and lay on his back, and eventually fell into a troubled sleep filled with the sound of rushing water, and his sister’s voice screaming in his ear.

* * *

It was Soos’s turn to keep watch.

The big young man sat on a rock near the campfire, leaning his chin on his hand, and wondered if his abuelita was doing okay, back home by herself.

Sometimes rats got in the house and tried to burrow in where her seams had started to tear, trying to make little rat nests, and it had always been Soos’s job to shoo them away and then sew her back up again. Increasingly often he’d been forced to get patches of ragged cloth and stitch them over her more worn-out areas. But who would protect her from vermin now that he was gone?

 _When I get that reward from the king, I’m gonna use it to buy her a whole new chair cover_ , he promised himself. _One made of gold, so if rats or moths try to chew on her they’re just gonna end up with broken teeth. And maybe some wheels so she can roll around the house instead of needing me to carry her if she wants a new view, made out of diamonds or something. That’s scientifically possible, right?_

He didn’t notice the triangle-shaped shadow moving along the ground.

Had Bill possessed a mouth, he would have had more teeth showing than a two-headed shrieking eel as he approached the obliviously sleeping group.

The big challenge, he thought to himself, was choosing which mind to invade...so many options lay spread before him, like the world’s most delicious banquet. He floated in a circle around them, considering his options.

Not the pig, obviously; he did have _some_ standards, thank you.

Or Question Mark, since he was still wide awake.

Ice? Nah, her mind was pretty uncompromising, even if he could find the center of her mindscape he doubted she’d let him take control before everyone woke up. Her family had never been as gullible as the Pineses.

With his options narrowed down, Bill looked at the other three sleeping forms.

 _“You should go into Stan’s mind,”_ Gideon suggested from the clearing. _“That’ll teach him to call me a little ventriloquist dummy! Now_ he _can be the dummy!”_ He cackled and rubbed his hands together, which caused him to break off a few fingers; Bill could hear him muttering angrily to himself as he dropped into the grass to search for them. His eye rolled a little.

 **_“Stan Pines knows who I am, marshmallow,”_ ** he scolded. **_“He’s got practice protecting himself from me, even in his sleep. Do I needa remind you which of us is the brains here?”_ **

He ignored the indignant squawk that resonated through their connection, and focused his attention on the sleeping twins.

After all, the goal here was to _destroy_ the Pines family. And the most sure way to do that wasn’t to go after a childless old man. It was to target the two children who were the only hope for continuation of the bloodline.

Besides, if Stanford found out, it would be the final straw needed to break him.

This next part would be difficult-it was always a challenge splitting his consciousness-but if Bill could pull it off, the rewards would be so, so worth it.

The triangle shivered, and then split, right down the middle. And one half went to each kid, hovered over them for a second...and then floated down into their heads.

* * *

_Dipper opened his eyes, and was startled to see that the sky was a beautiful light blue._

_For a while all he could do was stare at it, transfixed. He knew that the sky hadn’t always been red, of course, but he’d never imagined it this color before. It was one of the most beautiful things he’d ever seen._

_Then he looked around him, and saw that he was standing in a forest that smelled of pine needles. It was kind of like the vast wilderness he’d been traveling through, but with the blue sky overhead, and the warm sunshine dappling the leaves and no bubbles of pure chaos in sight, everything looked...different. Warmer. Friendlier._

_He turned in a little circle, staring at everything, feeling oddly relaxed despite the strangeness of the situation. And then he suddenly saw a small, bobbing light at the edge of the clearing._

_"That looks like a will-o’ the-wisp! I need to study it!"_

_Dipper pulled his journal out of his vest pocket, and moved towards the wisp; of course, it immediately began to float away._

_Undeterred, the boy chased after it._

In the real world, the sleeping Dipper slowly got to his feet, and began stumbling along in the direction of the river, with his hands positioned like he was writing in something.

Soos was currently distracted by a pair of sentient fireflies that were getting in a fight in front of him; he noticed nothing.

* * *

_Mabel opened her eyes, and found herself in a lush green meadow, with brightly colored flowers everywhere she looked and a beautiful blue sky overhead._

_Cautiously she reached out towards one of the flowers, and was delighted when it didn’t explode, or try to bite her hand, or any of the things flowers normally did back in the real world. With a wide smile she picked a handful and weaved them into a crown for her head, letting them nestle into her curls just right. Then she began skipping around the meadow, singing a little nonsense song mostly composed of the lyrics “La, la-la, la-la!” over and over._

_And then, as she spun around in a little circle, she and her singing both screeched to a halt at the sight before her._

_Standing in the middle of the meadow, long rainbow-colored mane fluttering in the breeze, was the most majestic, white, purple-eyed unicorn ever to pose in front of a rainbow. As soon as she saw that Mabel was watching her, she reared up onto her back legs, waving her dainty front hooves in the air and letting out an inviting (if somewhat high-pitched) “Neeeeeiiiiiggggghhhhh!!!!!”_

_After a second, Mabel’s eyes grew even bigger than usual, and she whispered, “I need to pet you more than anything in the world right now.”_

_To her dismay, once the unicorn landed on all fours again she shook her head, and then began trotting away._

_“Wait! Come back!” Mabel began chasing after her. “I have to fulfill my sudden lifelong dream!”_

Mabel staggered to her feet too, muttering, “Must...pet...unicorn…” in her sleep, and began sleepwalking in the same direction her brother had gone.

Soos was still watching the glowing dots of the fighting fireflies; he noticed nothing.

* * *

_Dipper chased the wisp through the trees and down a slope, until it finally came to a stop on the top of a tall rock. He scrambled up it, undeterred by how exhausted his noodly limbs were, and let out a triumphant “Ha!” as he reached the top._

_“Now you’ve got nowhere left to run!” he cried, pointing his pencil at the wisp. “Now you have to stay still and let me study you-”_

_The wisp rose higher into the air, and floated away in the breeze._

_“...Or you could do that.” Dipper lowered his journal with a disappointed sigh._

_And then nearly jumped out of his skin when a voice below him called, “There you are, my boy!”_

_“Aaah-what-who-”_

_Dipper barely managed not to lose his footing and fall-_

In the real world, Dipper staggered dangerously on the stepping stones he’d climbed onto, and it was by the sheerest of luck that the eel who lunged up didn’t get to sink its teeth into his foot before he moved.

_-but somehow he regained his balance and moved to get a better look at who or what was talking to him._

_It was a man; a very tall, gray-haired man, standing at the bottom of the boulder next to a mini waterfall. He couldn’t make out the face too well, but his smile was warm and friendly as he looked up and waved to him, and so was his voice. Something about him seemed very...familiar._

_“Look what I found!” the man said, gesturing to a group of strange creatures in the water._

_Dipper leaned down to get a better look; they were kind of like otters, except that they had tiny antlers and dappled coats, like a deer. They were still splashing and playing and tumbling around just like otters, and therefore being completely adorable, but a pair of them in another part of the pond appeared to be fighting over a female with their antlers._

_“Whoa! That’s so cool! What are they?”_

_“I’m trying to decide on a name for them right now,” the man admitted. He looked up at Dipper again, and smiled. “How about you jump down here, and we can study them together?”_

_Dipper looked down at the pool below him-and had to swallow nervously. “Um-it looks kind of far-”_

_“It’ll be okay! I’ll catch you, I promise!” He stepped around, and held out his arms. “Just jump down!”_

_One of the otter-deer creatures had climbed onto the bank, and a second later it leaped back in, splashing its friends._

_Dipper smiled despite himself. It did look kind of fun…_

* * *

_Mabel was still pursuing the unicorn._

_“Slow down, beautiful creature!” she called after it in frustration. “I need to feel your mane and see if it’s really as soft as it-” Her voice trailed off as she rounded a giant tree, and saw what lay before her. “...looks.”_

_It was a wide pool of pristine blue water, with a group of adorable animals clustered around and swimming in it. Things like bright pink bunnies, a whole group of unicorns with rainbow hair, and leaning on the side was a very handsome boy with long dark hair, and the beginnings of a tiny mustache._

_Mabel felt her heart do a little dance in her chest._

_“Whoa, is it hot out here, or is it just that guy?” she asked herself._

_Without hesitation she ran towards the pool._

_“Hi, beautiful stranger!” she chirped as she came close. “I’m Mabel! I’m twelve and have a pig, and might actually be a princess! You wanna get married?”_

_The boy tossed his hair back and laughed, revealing a) that he had a slight gap between his front teeth, and b) he had a surprisingly deep voice (not that Mabel was complaining, mind you). “Mabel, how nice to meet you! I admire your confidence in greeting people. Would you care to play the Marco Polo?”_

_“Would I!” Barely stopping to pet some of the animals, Mabel began slipping off her shoes._

A hungry eel was very confused when his would-be prey reached out and rubbed the top of his head and called him a ‘little cutie’; it stopped him from trying to take a bite out of her, even as she began pulling her shoes off.

* * *

Meanwhile, Waddles opened his eyes, and was alarmed to see that his master was not with him on the blanket. And even more alarmed when he sat up and looked around, and there was still no sign of her. An instinct in his little piggy brain was telling him that something was terribly, terribly wrong, and he needed one of the big people to make it right again. With a frightened squeal, he lunged at the biggest one and began tugging on his sleeve.

When all that got him was a muttered grumble to “shove off, Poi’dex’r” and being nudged away, he just put his snout right by the man’s ear, and let out his loudest squeal yet.

Stan woke with a start. “Aaagh! Hot Belgian waffles!”

He blinked his bleary eyes, and looked around groggily. “Oh wait, the kids aren’t here. I can swear for real!”

He took a deep breath, ready to really cuss out this pig (and possibly make him into pork chops, Mabel or no Mabel)-

-and then he realized.

“Wait a minute. Where are the kids?!”

Soos spun around, finally distracted from the dots. “Oh no! Curse my ability to be easily distracted by shiny objects!”

Wendy sat up, snatching her axe. “What happened?!”

“The kids aren’t here-go find ‘em!”

Fortunately, none of them had to look very far. They were just a little ways downstream.

Unfortunately, they appeared to have found a set of stepping stones that took them out towards the center of the river, and were standing on opposite sides of the biggest one-which was currently surrounded by a cluster of hungry-looking eels. And to Stan’s horror, they looked like they were seconds away from jumping right into them!

_What the heck are they doing?!_

“DIPPER! MABEL! STOP!”

Stan yelled louder than he could ever remember yelling anything in his life, sprinting towards them like a world-class Olympian and leaping from rock to rock. Despite how fast he was going, it felt like he was moving in slow motion, like he was about to be _too late_ again, no no no please not again-

“KIDS!!!!”

* * *

_Dipper heard something at the edge of his hearing; it made him pause just as he was about to jump, and glance over his shoulder. It was almost like...someone had just called his name._

_"That’s not important!” the man down below said. “Hurry up and jump, Pinetree! We don’t have much time!”_

_Dipper turned, and started working up his courage to jump again-_

_But wait._

_“...Pinetree?”_

_The man made a frustrated noise, and then stepped into the light._

_And Dipper gasped when he saw the strange yellow color of his eyes, and that his pupils were slitted like a cat’s._

_“Jump, curse you!”_

_Suddenly he seemed a lot taller, and he was lunging at Dipper with a mouth filled with long, sharp fangs-_

_Dipper jerked back, screaming in fright, as the sound of water began to roar in his ears-_

* * *

_“...Did you just hear something?” Mabel asked, pausing as she got ready to pull off her sweater so she wouldn’t get it soaked._

_The merman (merboy?) shook his head. “No, Mabel, nothing but the sound of your beautiful laughter. Please, jump in so we can start the game.”_

_She blushed and giggled. “Oh, you know just what to say!”_

_And then she heard the yell again. It sounded...upset. Like it wanted her to stop what she was doing._

_The merboy let out a frustrated noise. “Not you too!”_

_Something about his voice...sounded wrong. Less deep and foreign, more...high and nasally. And then, in horror, she watched his beautiful brown eyes change a weird yellow color, and saw him leaping up out of the water, baring his fangs-_

* * *

****

* * *

**They don’t get eaten, by the way.**

**The eels don’t get them.**

**Just thought I’d explain that to you, cuz some of you were looking a little nervous.**

**...And if you’re wondering how I knew that, you’re just gonna have to keep on wondering, aren’t you?** **  
  
**

**(Evil laughter)**

**Ahem. Sorry, where were we?**

* * *

****

* * *

Just as two eels leaped out of the water and lunged at the children, one of them was clubbed back down by Soos’s fist, and the other met the business end of Wendy’s axe.

A second later Stan had an arm around each child, yanking them away from the edges of the rock. The three of them collided in the middle, so he landed hard on his rear-but he barely felt the pain as he pulled them close, and began shaking them awake.

“Wake up kids, c’mon, wake up!”

Dipper’s eyes opened first, and he jerked his head up with a terrified shriek.

“The yellow eyes!”

Stan blinked. “...Huh?”

But Dipper wasn’t capable of speaking calmly at the moment; he began babbling in terror, grabbing onto the lapels of Stan’s coat.

“The yellow eyes-they were-and water-water everywhere-we were gonna-Mabel-where’s-”

“Hey, it’s okay, buddy, Mabel’s right here, waking up too.” Stan gently turned the boy’s chin so he could see his sister, who was now grabbing onto Stan’s other side in equal terror.

“The unicorn-” she sobbed- “the unicorn betrayed me-cute fish boy tried to eat me-”

Within seconds they were both crying hysterically into Stan’s chest.

Stan couldn’t remember the last time he’d been hugged like this.

He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been hugged, period (besides all those times Soos kept trying to hug him, as much as he had ordered him to stop).

For a second all he could do was sit there numbly, as their tiny arms wrapped around him as far as they could reach; then, slowly, he put one arm around each of their shoulders, and rubbed their backs.

“Ssh...it was just a couple of nightmares. It’s okay, kids. You’re safe now. You’re safe.”

Soos sat down on Dipper’s side and draped both his big arms around him, and Wendy knelt next to Mabel and rested an arm on her shoulder (keeping her axe ready in case any other eels got any ideas).

After a moment of waiting for them to calm down, they made their way back to camp, where Waddles was waiting.


	14. If you want something done right...

“NOOOOO!!!! GRAAAAAHHHHH!!!!”

The glade exploded with bursts of angry blue fire, lashing at the thorny walls and bursting through whatever gaps it could, while the tiny figure in the blue suit surged back and forth, sounding like he was lucky to have any vocal chords left with how much he (they?) was shrieking.

Pacifica just did her best to stay out of his line of sight, and grabbed the burned corpses of a couple of squirrels that hadn’t moved away from the flames in time (having learned the hard way never to miss an opportunity for a free meal).

And then, as suddenly as it happened, the raging stopped.

For a second Gideon stood stock still, chubby shoulders heaving up and down, as little fires burned here and there, and Pacifica picked tiny pieces of meat off what was left of the carcasses. She nearly got scared right out of her ragged shoes when he started laughing.

It was a high, giggly kind of laughter-not quite the nasally cackling of the other one, but still pretty unnerving. Especially when he turned, letting her see that he was grinning from ear to ear, and shaking his head hard enough that she worried it was about to fall off (again; last time had  _ not _ been fun, let me tell you).

“What am I  _ doing _ ?!” Gideon demanded. “I’ve been wasting mah time here tryna take care of ‘em with minions and spells, when the answer’s been right in front of me all along!”

“Uh…” Pacifica made herself as small as possible.

“I can just go an’ kill the Pines family myself!” He pointed to the hole Pacifica had made when she first crashed into this trap however-long-ago. “I got all my magic now, and there’s an opening lettin’ me break free! I can beat them to Gravity Falls, and when they get there I can tear ‘em limb from limb!” He burst into more tasteless laughter.

_ Eesh, no wonder the king got rid of this creep, _ she found herself thinking for the hundredth time.

Of course, shortly thereafter his eyes changed as the other one took over, laughing equally gleefully.

**_“Oh_ ** **yes** **_, it has been so_ ** **long** **_since I’ve visited Gravity Falls!”_ ** he crowed, producing a comb out of nowhere and running it through his hair, before fixing the jewel around his neck like some kind of weird tie.  **_“I hope Stanford’s ready to be surprised!”_ **

Then he marched up to right under the hole in the trap, and the jewel began to glow. After a second, though, it stopped. The other one looked confused.

**_“What’s the holdup, short stack?”_ **

There was a moment of silence; he abruptly scowled.

**_“What?!_ ** **Why** **_?!”_ **

Another silence.

At last he rolled his eyes.

**_“Ugh, fiiiine…”_ **

He twisted his head around to an almost unnatural angle, and his gaze landed on Pacifica.

**_“Hey, you! You coming or what?”_ **

The girl blinked.

“...What?”

**_“Apparently Zombie Boy here thinks we’re obligated to take you with us since you’re our minion now-”_ **

“ExCUSE me?!”

**_“-so you better get over here before I change my mind!”_ **

* * *

On the one hand, whether or not she was really a Northwest anymore, Pacifica was NO ONE’S minion, especially not the one of a yellow-eyed undead creep who’d used magic to give himself a split personality!

...On the other hand, it seemed like he was her only option for finally escaping this dumb trap.

With a reluctant glare she stamped her way over to him/them/whatever.

A few seconds later she was surrounded by the blue-green light, for the third time in her life, and they were rapidly rising up, up, up...and away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You better watch out,  
> You better not cry,  
> You better not pout,  
> I'm tellin' you why...
> 
> Bill Cipher is coming-to town!


	15. Meanwhile, back in Gravity Falls...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yay! You guys get a two-for-one deal! Two short chapters in basically the same day!
> 
> Consider it me celebrating the fact that my doctor's appointment earlier was a success, and a disgusting big blob of orange-brown earwax was unclogged from my ear so I can hear again!
> 
> ...Maybe that's a little too much information, huh?

“Grenda, are you sure that this will work?” Candy looked around nervously as the two girls stepped through the gates of the old junkyard. Everywhere she looked there were “NO TRESPASSING” signs, and even a few magical sigils had been drawn into the piles of trash; they looked far more powerful than the kind most people used. “If we could not fool the old man who was giving auditions, I doubt that we can fool the actual king.”

“COME ON, CANDY! WE CAME ALL THIS WAY, WE HAVE TO AT LEAST GIVE IT A SHOT.” Grenda adjusted the giant floral skirt she was wearing, before marching purposefully up to the decrepit shack in the center of the yard and pounding on the door.

...Unfortunately, the door was just an old piece of animal skin, and made no noise whatsoever.

Grenda scowled in disappointment, but then just pounded on the metal wall next to it. It created a nice satisfying ringing sound.

“GREAT UNCLE! ARE YOU HOME-AUGH!”

The speech was cut off by two giant, clawed robot arms appearing out of either side of the shack; one of them snatched her, pinning her arms to her sides, and the other grabbed Candy in the same fashion. Seconds later the two girls were being hoisted screaming into the air.

“A-HA!”

A spindly little man whose face was mostly beard and nose burst out the door, glaring up at them through a pair of bright green goggles and brandishing a stick. “Thought ya could vandalize my house again, didja? Well I gotcha now, ya salt-lickin’, hornswagglin’-”

“WE’RE NOT VANDALS!” Grenda interrupted. “WE’RE HERE TO SEE YOU, GREAT-UNCLE KING, SIR! WE’RE YOUR LONG-LOST NIECE AND NEPHEW!”

There was a brief silence, before the old man folded his arms and gave both of them a scolding look.

“There’s two things wrong with that. One, I ain’t the king.”

Grenda and Candy glanced at each other.  _ Oops _ .  _ Guess the people in town were wrong after all about where he lived. _

“An’ two, you obviously ain’t the Pines twins. Ya ain’t even twins! And you’re both girls!”

Grenda blinked, and then smiled. “HEY, YOU DIDN’T ASSUME I’M A BOY JUST BECAUSE OF MY VOICE! THANKS!”

“No problem. Now git on outta here, shoo!”

He pulled a small remote out of the pocket of his overalls, and pressed a button; the giant robot arms raised themselves, and then tossed the girls back over the fence.

After they thumped to the ground, the gate slammed itself shut.

* * *

McGucket shook his head with a sigh, and then wandered back into the hut as he re-pocketed his remote.

The inside was a mess of wires and lights, with glass beakers filled with mysterious liquids strewn here and there; he lightly stepped around them without needing to pay much attention to where he was going, and returned to the spot where he’d been working on what looked like some kind of bizarre robotic weapon.

A speaker at his elbow crackled, and a voice demanded, “Who was that?”

Even though the one asking couldn’t see him, McGucket shrugged and grabbed a screwdriver. “Jes’ more kids who showed up tryna claim they’re your niece and nephew. Prob’ly after that ‘reward’ the last ones mentioned.”

The voice made a disgusted noise. “I don’t know where these people got the idea that I have some kind of reward available, even if my niece and nephew  _ were _ somehow still alive.” He sounded very old and tired as he said that last part.

“One o’ those crazy rumors, I guess.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...Surprise!


	16. Travelling vignettes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's funny how I get my best inspiration for writing at times when I know there's a lot of other things I should be working on.  
> Or how I sit down at my computer intending to work on something important, get distracted by other stuff, and before I know it it's almost midnight.  
> I'm beginning to wonder if I have adult ADHD or something.

In hindsight Stan realized that it would have been better to have his group cross the river right after saving the kids, since they were already in the middle of the river, and he could’ve just sent Soos back to grab their stuff.

Instead, like an idiot, he took them back to camp to try and catch a little more sleep, so by the time they set out again they were more afraid of the water than they’d been  _ before _ they were almost eaten by eels while sleepwalking.

It wasn’t like they started blubbering again or anything like that; it was just that Dipper was clearly seconds away from a panic attack as they approached the stepping stones, and even Mabel’s normally indomitable cheerfulness had been taken down several octaves, making her cling to her pig nervously.

Stan decided to try to fix at least one of those problems right now; he glanced at Wendy, and tilted his head in the boy’s direction. Taking the hint, she reached out and squeezed Dipper’s shoulder.

“It’s gonna be okay, dude. You got this.”

And then (it was more than he’d expected from her; if money had still had value he would  _ definitely _ have given her a raise) she wrapped her hand around his, and began leading him across the stepping stones.

It worked better than Stan had hoped; Dipper seemed to forget all about his previous terror because of the lovesick haze he was trapped in, and Mabel was too busy giggling about it with her pig to be scared either.

_ Lesson learned: when you’ve got traumatized kids on your hands, screw with their emotions so they’ll think about something else instead of the job at hand. _

* * *

“So, Soos, you said you have a grandma?” Mabel asked as they gingerly made their way through a grove of trees that were covered in giant cactus spines (they had to be extra careful around them, as the juice dripping from some of the needles could cause hallucinations; Soos had tasted some of it when they first entered this part of the forest, and spent the rest of the day thinking they were in the middle of the ocean surrounded by giant mushrooms).

“Oh, yeah.” He beamed. “She’s been pretty much the one who raised me since I was four, and she’s the best! She’s got the most comfortable lap in the world!”

Wendy whispered to the twins, “She’s also probably got the strongest legs in the world.” All of them had to stifle giggles.

Oblivious, the big man went on, “She used ta make the world’s best enchiladas before the sky turned red, but she can’t really be around fire anymore, and the one time she tried to teach me howta make ‘em I nearly burned her cushions, so mostly I just try to remember what they tasted like.”

...Dipper liked Soos, he really did, but sometimes he had no clue what he was talking about.

* * *

At one point they came across a set of natural hot springs in the middle of a secluded glade. They proved to be monster- and magic-free, and the water was only about waist-deep, so even Dipper took the opportunity to bathe.

He had to admit, as he splashed around in the warm, sulfur-smelling water, that it felt good to clean off the dirt and sweat that travelling got him caked in. And the temperature and stillness were enough to push away his usual fears of deep water, so before he knew it he actually started singing an old ballad to himself.

“ _ Disco girl, _

_ Comin’ through, _

_ That girl is you- _

_ Ooh-ooh-ooh, ooh-ooh-ooh… _ ”

He’d just reached the third verse when he heard a muffled snickering to his left.

Dipper whirled around with a splash, to see Stan sitting on the edge of a nearby hot spring with his legs in the water; he was wearing a pair of faded blue striped shorts (thank goodness), but still showing far more old man body than he’d ever wanted to see.

“Lovely voice ya got there, kid,” he said with an unrepentant grin.

Dipper blushed crimson and finished his bath in silence.

* * *

It took Wendy much longer than Soos to open up about her family, but a few days (?) later, when they were getting ready to go to sleep, she admitted to the twins, “The day the sky turned red...my dad tried to lead a group of people in a rebellion against all the monsters.” She stared down at the blade of her axe as she sharpened it, rather than at any of them. “All of them, including him and my three brothers, got turned to stone by eye-bats, and then just left in a pile in the woods as an example to the rest of us.”

Dipper tried to think of something comforting he could say; but really, what kind of comfort could you possibly give for something like that? In the end, all he was able to stammer out was, “...That’s awful.”

Wendy shrugged. “It’s whatever. Gives me another reason to wanna kick that dumb demon’s butt if I ever lay eyes on him.” Only the slight clenching of her jaw gave away that she wasn’t as laid-back about it as she was acting. “At least it means they’re not getting eaten by anything, and they can’t get hurt. If they ever unfreeze, though, they’ll probably be freaked out by how tall I am now.” She tried to smile. “I was already taller than my brothers, but now I’m a  _ giant _ compared to them.”

Mabel and Waddles leaned against her side, the younger girl wrapping her arms around her waist without hesitation. She seemed startled by the gesture, but didn’t push her off like Dipper was half-expecting her to. Instead she just finished sharpening the axe, and held it up to inspect it in the dim red light.

Without meaning to, Dipper found himself saying, “...People used to make fun of my weird birthmark until I started hiding it all the time.” As soon as he registered what he’d just said he felt like slapping himself.

_ She just gave you this huge emotional revelation, dummy, why are you talking about yourself and your stupid birthmark?! _

But Wendy seemed to appreciate the change of topic; her expression relaxed, and her eyes lit up with a mischievous gleam.

“Oh, now you  _ have _ to show us!”

“Unless, y’know, it’s in a really personal spot or something,” Soos cut in.

“N-no, it’s not-!” Dipper could feel himself blushing.

“Show us, show us!” Wendy chanted.

“Ugh,  _ fine _ !” Dipper sat up until he was facing his friends, took a deep breath, and then pushed his bangs back off his forehead.

“...The Big Dipper!” Wendy realized in amazement. “So  _ that’s _ where your name came from!”

“Yeah, we couldn’t remember our real names, but when Mr. Poolcheck saw his birthmark he just decided his name was Dipper from now on!” Mabel beamed.

“Huh. I thought he just hated you or something.”

“Eh, he probably did,” Dipper admitted.

“You shouldn’t be ashamed of it, dude,” Soos said. “Its uniqueness is one of the things that makes you special.”

“That’s what I keep telling him! See, bro-bro, you should listen to me sometimes!”

“Yeah, well, it’s easier to remember when you’re not surrounded by people who keep calling you Dipstick, or worse stuff.”

At that moment Stan came back from gathering food. “What’s goin’ on, kids?”

“Dipper was just showing us his totally awesome birthmark! Show Mr. Boss, Dipper!”

The boy was understandably hesitant. Considering how much the old man enjoyed messing with him already, he didn’t need to give him more ammunition to work with.

...On the other hand, it was probably too late to back out now, and Stan was staring down at him with curious interest as he set down the pile of edibles he’d managed to collect. So he sighed, and pushed back his bangs again.

Stan’s reaction was...not what he was expecting.

For a second he got a strange look on his face, similar to the one he’d had when he first saw Dipper and Mabel back in the old palace. It only lasted for a second this time, before he said, “Huh. Neat,” and then leaned down and started building up the fire.

It was a relief that he wasn’t making fun of him...but even though he spent the rest of the night acting normal, laughing at Mabel’s jokes and telling some story about the time he went to jail for trading people silks that dyed your skin purple, Dipper could tell that something about his birthmark had shaken the old man up, and he didn’t know what.

* * *

_...No way. _

_ No way in a million years- _

_ I can’t believe I actually- _

_ It’s them it’s really them after six long years I finally- _

_ Should I tell them? _

_...Nah, better not. Don’t even know how ta start. _

~~_ I don’t want them ta hate me. _ ~~

_ They’re gonna haveta find out sooner or later...but it’ll be better when we’re all together. So even if-even if things don’t go how I want ‘em to, they’ll still have a great uncle ta look after ‘em. _

_ It can wait. _

* * *

The next day, the little group finally arrived on the edge of a valley. They couldn’t see many details from how high up they were, but they could see a village surrounded by woodland, and an unusual-looking waterfall in one part that appeared to be made of what Dipper was hoping was just bright red water, and that was falling upwards.

Stan planted his foot on top of a large rock, and made a sweeping gesture with the end of his cane.

“Welcome, folks, to Gravity Falls!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wish granted, Draco.  
> You know what I'm referring to. ;)


	17. Gravity Falls holds the key to your heart

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I told myself I was gonna finish this chapter tonight if it killed me. And I did.  
> So you better dang well appreciate it.

To the kids’ surprise, instead of going down into the center of the town, Stan led them to a small wooden cabin just outside of it.

It looked as old and broken-down as the palace had been, but something about its composition told Dipper that it was probably supposed to be like this. It had a funny, half-broken weathervane at the top that, if you squinted, you could see had the letters W, H, A and T, instead of typical compass directions (Dipper wondered if the original owners, whoever they were, were unusually curious or something). Several tiles had fallen off the roof, and the whole place was in need of a good coat of paint and probably some extensive remodeling-but other than that, it looked like it had done a pretty good job avoiding most of the destruction that other places had undergone after the day the sky turned red.

Stan let out a small sigh as he climbed the steps, looking with a disapproving frown at the amount of dirt and dust coating the porch. He muttered something that sounded oddly like “might’ve known,” but since he was opening the front door at the same time it could’ve been just a figment of Dipper’s imagination. Funny; the door must not have been locked, because he had no trouble getting in. On the other hand, he wouldn’t put it past Stan to have just picked the lock.

The inside of the house wasn’t much better than the outside; every spare part of the ceiling appeared to be hung with cobwebs, and even what appeared to be a sparrow’s nest in one corner, and everything was coated in a fine layer of dust. But once you got past all that, it was…

Dipper slowly realized that this was the most intriguing house he had ever been in (though, considering he’d been in an orphanage as far back as he could remember, that wasn’t saying much).

Every corner was packed with curious items: a big gorilla-like taxidermy creature wearing underpants, a jar filled with eyeballs, a painting of a horse riding on another horse-it was all really weird, but also kind of fascinating.

_ What kind of people lived here to come up with this stuff? _

As they wandered between rooms, Dipper’s eyes landed on one that was bordered wall to wall with books-not the flimsy penny dreadfuls that Wendy liked to read, oh no-beautiful, thick, leather-bound volumes that were already setting his mouth watering. And in the middle of the room sat a table decorated with what had to be the most elaborate chemistry set in existence. Even for as long as it had obviously been abandoned, he was drawn to it like a moth to a flame.

“Careful, some of that stuff’ll probably make you explode if ya don’t handle it right,” Stan warned, pulling him away by the back of his shirt.

“But-but science-”

“Nope. Not gonna happen.”

“This place is amazing!” Mabel gasped, doing a little spin in the center of the living room with Waddles clutched in her arms (the amount of time she spent carrying him around seemed to have built up her upper-body strength). “Look at all this cool stuff! How did you know about this place?”

“...Let’s just say I got friends in high places.” Stan settled into a big yellow chair that seemed to have almost been designed for him. “It’s got a lotta protection spells around it, so figure we can take a bit ta rest up before we go find McGucket.”

“Aw, c’mon, we’re not tired!” Mabel protested; she jumped in front of him and started bouncing on the tips of her toes. “I wanna go find him now!”

“Well, not all of us have got young limbs like you, so just give me a chance ta rest, wouldya?”

Mabel sighed dramatically. “Fiiiiine…”

“C’mon, Mabel, we can check out the library again-see if they have any age-inappropriate romance novels,” Dipper coaxed.

Seconds later there was practically a cloud of smoke where Mabel had been standing, and she was already charging towards the library with a cry of “RACEYOUGUYSTHERE!”

Dipper, Soos and Wendy charged after her, eager to explore some more.

Stan and the pig looked at each other.

Stan sighed. “When did kids get so crazy and hyperactive all the time?”

Waddles grunted a few times.

“I know, right?” Stan leaned his head back with a tired-sounding sigh. “...I just gotta play it cool for a little longer…”

* * *

Despite their fun in exploring the house (Mabel managed to find a whole shelf of romance novels, belonging to a series entitled  _ The Duchess Approves _ -they didn’t seem as age-inappropriate as she usually liked them, but she grabbed the first one anyway), eventually the little group ended up taking a small nap up in the attic. There were a pair of twin beds up there already, so Dipper and Mabel ended up sharing one, while Wendy took the other, and Soos sprawled on his sleeping bag on the floor. When they woke up again they all had some of their rations, and then, leaving Waddles to watch over the house (according to Soos), they slipped out and headed towards town.

As they got close, Stan pulled his scarf up to cover his eyes and nose again.

“I should probably mention that ya might not wanna say my name out loud, ‘kay?”

“Geez, you got a criminal record out here too?” Wendy asked with a raised eyebrow.

“You don’t know everything about me, red,” Stan retorted. He led them over towards, unexpectedly, a junkyard.

“...Not to ask the obvious, but what are we doing here?” Dipper asked.

“This is where McGucket lives.” Stan ducked through the gap in the fence, and headed towards the dilapidated hovel in the middle of the place. Oddly enough, the garbage seemed to have been organized into separate piles at some point, with things like wire and metal and glass closer to the middle.

“...And he’s the best friend of the king?”

“He gets better robot material here.” Stan reached out and knocked on the wall of the house-in-only-the-loosest-sense-of-the-word, and then jumped back just before two enormous robot arms that appeared to be made from assorted pieces of scrap metal could grab him. “See what I mean?”

Seconds later, a spindly little old man came bursting out the door while brandishing a stick.

“A _ ha _ ! I got ya this time, ya carpet-baggin’-”

He stopped, and gave Stan a quizzical look.

“...Have we met?”

Stan took a step back. “No! Nope, you’ve never seen me before in your life. Nuh-uh.”

The old man tilted his head. “Your voice sounds awful familiar-like.”

“I get that from a lot of people. It’s a very easy voice ta mix up with someone else’s.” Stan cleared his throat, and then said, “Besides that’s not the point. We’re here cuz we wanna see the king.”

The old man, who Dipper was guessing was McGucket, folded his arms. “You and ever’one else just about, lately. I suppose you’ve got his long-lost niece and nephew, too.”

Stan stepped around to behind Dipper and Mabel, and pushed them forward. “See for yourself.”

McGucket looked for a second like he was about to sic his robot arms on them again...but then he squinted at the children.

“...You sure look more like ‘em than the others.”

_ Others? _ Dipper thought.  _ What others? _

“Whaddya know about the Pines family?” he asked.

“Just what he’s told us.” Mabel pointed at Stan, who looked for a second like he was about to correct her but then just let out a small annoyed grunt. “We can’t really remember much about anything from before we were six, when we were found wandering in the woods.”

“That’s awful convenient.” McGucket turned his glare back up at Stan.

“C’mon, how many other genuine twins do ya think are wanderin’ around right now who’re the right age? Especially ones where the boy actually has the same birthmark on his forehead?”

Dipper blinked. “Wait, what?”

Before he could react, McGucket had stepped up and shoved back his bangs with one bandaged hand. His eyes widened, and a heavily callused thumb scrubbed at the boy’s birthmark.

“Ow, hey!”

“Sorry, jes’ makin’ sure it’s real.” He released him and tapped his chin (maybe; it was hard to tell through that beard). “Okay, so you got two kidlets who look right, and one of ‘em’s got the birthmark that the boy had. So  _ maybe _ they’re the right ones-”

“OH COME ON!” Stan roared in frustration, “What other proof do ya need?!”

“The king’s been through enough grief and heartache after losin’ his whole family in one fell swoop, I ain’t gonna get his hopes up jes’ ta crush ‘em again!”

The two old men each stepped back, took a few deep breaths. Finally Stan said, “Look, can’t ya do some kinda blood test? I heard the king’s got some kinda science alchemy stuff he could use ta check and see if they’re related ta him.”

McGucket’s eyes widened. “Yeah, actually, he does. Not many people know ‘bout that, though.” His critical gaze turned back to Stan. “...What didja say your name was again?”

“I didn’t.”

He folded his arms. “Well, are ya gonna give me a name?”

“Steve. Steve Pinington.”

Maybe it was his imagination again, but Dipper thought something changed in McGucket’s expression. He gave a long, slow nod. “Uh-huh. Well...Steve. You’re definitely more convincing than other people who’ve claimed ta have the Pines twins on hand...fer a number o’ reasons. So, he probably won’t like it, an’ it’s against a lotta my better judgement, but I’m gonna take ya ta see the king.”


	18. The Pines family's excellent communication skills

McGucket went back into his home, and returned leading the strangest creature any of them had ever seen.

It looked kind of like a raccoon, but it was made of metal, and had two bright lights in place of eyes, and made strange clicking, whirring noises when it walked.

Wendy was the first of them to figure out what it actually was.

“Dude. Is that one of your robots?” Her eyes lit up with delight.

“Yup!” McGucket tugged his overalls proudly. “She’s mah Coon-Wife 3000! Best durn monster fighter this side o’ New Jersey, _an_ ’ she makes a great cuppa coffee!”

The raccoon-robot made a beeping noise, and a little slot opened in her side; a tiny hand appeared out of it clutching a steaming cup, which McGucket snatched and took a generous gulp of. He tossed the cup over his shoulder, which created a crash and the sounds of startled chickens, and hamboned on his knee.

“Let’s go, sweetie!”

And he headed for the gates.

The little group looked at each other.

“...When he says ‘wife,’ does he mean-?” Mabel began.

“Don’t think about it too hard, kid.” Stan adjusted his hat, and headed after the inventor.

* * *

They found themselves heading back into the woods, winding their way past a couple of bubbles of pure chaos and a giant sentient water tower gnawing on a few treetops, until they reached a clearing with one large tree in the center.

Wendy tilted her head. “Dude, does that branch look like a lever to anyone else?” She pointed to a branch close to the top of the tree, which, when you got a good look at it, did look kind of fake.

McGucket looked impressed. “Y’ain’t wrong, young’un.” He nodded to the Coon-Wife, who reared up on her hind legs and scrambled up the side of the tree; when she reached the right branch, she pushed on it with her head; seconds later, the ground began to shake beneath their feet, and then, around the tree, it began to sink.

Within a minute, there was a vast well-like hole opened up in the ground, and as they watched, a set of stairs began to grow out of the sides in a spiraling pattern.

...Dipper really, _really_ hoped that the king was genuinely his blood relative, because right now he had just joined his list of coolest people in the world.

The group descended the stairs into what appeared to be an underground bunker.

One wall was lined with food boxes, which were labelled with dates going over a century into the future. A cabinet hung open in a corner, revealing an assortment of vicious-looking weapons. And everything, just about, was coated in a layer of dust almost as thick as the one back at the cabin, except here there was evidence of someone with thick, heavy boots walking through it once in a while.

McGucket gingerly led the way through the mess. “...He hasn’t gone out in a while.”

Stan snorted, in a way that sounded oddly bitter. “So, what, he just hides down here all the time while the rest o’ the world burns? Some king _he_ turned out ta be.”

“He’s been tryna figger out a way ta close up the hole in the sky an’ get ridda all the monsters, an’ it’s a mite hard ta do when every critter in the world that’s unner the demon’s command’s been ordered ta kill him on sight.” McGucket wandered over to a small, circular door in the wall, and opened it by turning the wheel in the middle. He peered inside, and then looked back over his shoulder at them.

“He...probably ain’t gonna be too happy with me fer bringin’ you folks in here. Might be better if jes’ one o’ you goes in ta see him first.”

Stan hesitated, and then nodded. “Yeah, okay. Guess one of us oughta announce you two properly.” He looked at Wendy. “Red, you up for the job?”

She gave him a confused stare. “Wh-you’re not gonna do it?”

Dipper and Mabel were equally nonplussed. If anyone seemed like the best candidate for presenting them to the king of New Jersey, it was Stan.

“Yeah, Steve, I was actually thinkin’ it might be best if you went in first,” said McGucket. “Seein’ as you seem like the leader of this here group.”

Even with the scarf covering his face, Dipper couldn’t help thinking that Stan looked...nervous. He rubbed the back of his neck with one hand, and looked down at his boots, before at last he said hesitantly, “...Okay.”

“Welp, glad that’s settled!”

McGucket pulled the door open all the way, and used the Coon-Wife as a step up into the tunnel that was inside; she scrambled in after him, and they disappeared into the darkness beyond.

Stan looked for a second like he wanted to say something...but then he just turned and followed him.

Of course, the kids clustered around the edge of the doorway to watch.

* * *

The next room was radically different from the bunker area; for one thing, it was completely empty save for another door at the other end of the room. For another, the walls, floor and ceiling looked kind of like a giant jigsaw puzzle of some kind, all broken up into different interconnecting shapes.

“Don’t step on the tile with a symbol on it-it’ll trigger a booby trap that’ll crush ya flat!” McGucket said cheerfully as he and the Coon-Wife went to the other door and peered inside.

Stan could feel sweat trickling down his forehead, and wiped at it nervously. He really, really wasn’t prepared for this.

And then there the king was, treading into the room and glaring at him suspiciously.

* * *

You couldn’t tell, just by looking at him, that this was a king.

Oh, sure, he had a good posture and broad shoulders like you’d expect from one, but that was all.

He had no crown, just a mop of floofy gray hair with a paler stripe down around his ears, and a few tufts up by his forehead smoking and sizzling. His clothes were a shabby-looking, red, high-collared shirt and long tan coat over black trousers, none of which even had so much as an ermine trim to them. And he had a pair of goggles dangling around his neck, and his face (except for the area around his eyes, which were covered by black-framed glasses) was covered in ash like he’d just been caught in an explosion. Honestly, he looked more like a mad scientist than a king.

Even more astonishing, though, was that he could be Stan’s twin brother.

No, really, they had pretty much the same face. The only difference was that the king’s hair was fluffier, and his chin had a tiny cleft in it. And it was hard to tell in this lighting, but there was something a little off about his hands…

“Who is this?!” the king demanded. “Fiddleford, what did I tell you about bringing people down here?!”

“I had the feeling you ought ta meet this one, Stanford,” the inventor replied frankly.

In the other room, the children looked at each other.

“Stanford?” Mabel whispered.

But that was almost-a man who looked almost exactly like Stan, and had almost the same name as him-what could that-

Wait.

Did that mean Stan was-

Suddenly all the pieces of the puzzle were falling into place for Dipper,

“Are you guys thinking what I’m thinking?” he asked in a breathy whisper.

Soos nodded slowly, sagely. “Mr. Boss is the _real_ king of New Jersey, and this guy is his evil clone!”

“...I don’t think that’s quite right.”

“So there _was_ a third brother,” Wendy breathed. “Your abuelita was right, Soos.”

“...In retrospect, that makes a lot more sense.”

“Ssh, something’s happening!”

* * *

Before Stan could begin the spiel that was rapidly forming in his mind, McGucket hopped up onto his robot’s shoulders so that he was level with Stan; and then, without warning, the inventor grabbed his scarf and yanked it down, exposing his face to the king.

For a second they just stared at each other.

Then the king’s jaw clenched, and his expression darkened with deep, rapidly rising rage.

“ _YOU_.”

Any hopes Stan might have had that his brother didn’t still hate him were instantly dashed to pieces.

“Wait,” he said, raising his hands in as calming a gesture as he was capable of. “Just listen ta me, Poindexter-”

Stanford wasn’t listening.

“I might have known it was you.” He laughed, a horrible, bitter sound that hurt almost as bad as his words. “You’re the one who spread the idea around about my offering a reward for someone finding the children, didn’t you?”

Stan flinched.

“Now hold on,” Fiddleford started to say, “I didn’t bring him here so you could fight-”

“That was low, even for you, _Stanley_ .” Ford spat out his name like a curse. “Putting false hope in people’s ears that I would have anything to give them when we’re in the middle of the _apocalypse_ , just so I would let you come back-”

“I was thinking that it was the quickest way ta find the kids! If there’s one way I know how ta appeal ta people, it’s with their greed!” Stan shot back.

“The kids are _dead_!” Ford shouted. Then, with the fire in his voice replacing itself with ice again, “You should have accepted that by now. They’re dead. And it’s your fault.”

It stung, of course. Nothing he shouldn’t have expected, but it still stung. But Stan shook his head and stood his ground. “No. Cuz I found them. And I brought them back.”

Ford folded his arms, raising a cynical eyebrow. “Oh, of _course_ you did. I’m sure you picked two children who look enough like them to seem real, and told them everything you know about our family-”

“The boy has the exact same birthmark Mason did! How exactly would I fake that?!”

“I did check, Stanford, it seems pretty real,” Fiddleford cut in.

Ford rounded on him. “What did he bribe you with?!”

“Wha-nothing!”

“Don’t try to trick me!” Ford’s voice was becoming more unhinged by the second. “You’re both banished! Get out, and take your lies with you!”

And then he slammed his boot down on the booby-trapped tile.

A few seconds later the walls started closing in-literally. Along with the ceiling, and the floor, with tiles rising in a random pattern.

McGucket uttered a string of impressive cuss words and lunged for the door, with the Coon-Wife on his heels; it had slammed shut when the trap was activated, but he did some kind of rapid-fire tinkering that forced it open again. Stan, however, stood numbly for a moment, before trying to lunge through the rapidly-shrinking maze.

“No! Stanford, wait! It’s really them!”

Ford just stalked back into the room he’d come out of; the door slammed shut.

_No. No no NO_

“STANFORD!”

Suddenly Fiddleford was on one side, and his robot was on his other, both of them grabbing him and shoving him through to safety; then they scrambled up after him, just before the last tiles slammed together.

* * *

There was nowhere else to go but back out into the bunker-where Stan met four pairs of accusing eyes.

“You were _using_ us?” Dipper finally whispered, in quiet disbelief.

“And there wasn’t even a reward? You lied to _all_ of us?” Wendy’s hands were clenched into trembling fists at her sides, and for once, her tough exterior had crumpled enough for her eyes to fill with angry tears.

Soos couldn’t even speak; he just stared down at his feet, looking lost and confused and above all _hurt_.

Stan felt his heart clench in his chest. “No, I-look, I know this all seems nuts, but I wasn’t lying about-just lemme explain-”

“I don’t wanna hear it!” Dipper shouted. “I don’t wanna hear whatever other lies you’re gonna throw at us, just _leave us alone_!” And he grabbed Mabel’s hand, and stormed towards the stairs; Wendy quickly followed, and after Soos snatched up the pig (who’d been over in the corner trying to get into one of the storage boxes), he followed all of them.

“Mabel, please!” Stan appealed to the one who seemed like she could be his last hope. “Do ya really think I’m a bad guy?”

Mabel pulled to a stop, looking down at him uncertainly.

“I-I wanna believe you, but-”

Dipper didn’t give her time to finish; he just yanked her into moving again.

Seconds later, they were gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...To be fair, there was probably no good way for that conversation to end.
> 
> Believe me, writing this hurt me just as much as reading it hurts you.


	19. No country for old men

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy October, everyone.  
> Have a new chapter in celebration.

“...Maybe that wasn’t mah best idea ever,” Fiddleford said at last.

A few seconds later he was lying flat on his back, blinking in shock as a rush of pain (and a lot of blood) flooded his nostrils.

“YA  _ THINK _ ?!” Stan roared, unclenching his trembling fist. The Coon-Wife 3000 snarled and tried to take a bite out of him; he barely noticed, fending her off with his cane as he continued to yell. “What the heck, you deluded hick?! I was gonna wait ta see if he would be okay with seein’ me again before actually showin’ him who I am cuz I suspected somethin’ like this’d happen!”

“That’s prob’ly why I live in the dump.” Slowly the inventor sat up, clamping a hand to his nose. He waited for the bloodflow to ebb before looking up at Stan again. “I jes’ thought Stanford’d spent enough time not knowing what became o’ his brother.”

Stan snorted in disgust. “Yeah, cuz he was clearly broken up about that, considering he’s the one who  _ banished  _ me in the first place!”

Excuses for his friend’s behavior started to rise to Fiddleford’s lips...but faded away just as quickly. He knew that Stan probably knew them all already, and that they didn’t change how badly he’d been hurt. Instead he whispered, “...I think he cares, whether he admits it ta hisself or not.”

Stan didn’t look like he believed him; he just cast a mournful glance up towards the stairs, where the kids had vanished to.

“...Those really are your niece and nephew, ain’t they?”

Stan gave him a withering glance. “Glad ta know ya think I’m such a lowlife I’d bring home fakes an’ try tellin’ Ford they’re the real deal.”

“I’m not sayin’ that!” Fiddleford protested. “I’m just impressed that ya found ‘em after all this time! I wasn’t sure they’d have survived on their own fer so long!”

“Whatever.” Stan began pacing in a little circle, in a way that gave him a surprising resemblance to his twin.

The Coon-Wife had by now given up trying to attack him, and came and sat down next to Fiddleford; he pressed the top of her head in a certain spot, putting her in sleep mode for the time being.

After a minute of pacing, Stan whirled around to face Fiddleford. “Okay, okay, you helped get me into this mess, so you’re gonna help me fix it.”

Despite himself, he felt his defenses rise. “Uh, excuse me, I ain’t the one who-”

A second later Fiddleford found himself being lifted off his feet by the front of his overalls, and nose to nose with Stan.

“You’re. Going. To help me fix it.”

Fiddleford swallowed, patted the hand gripping his clothes.

“...You got it, Stanley.”

* * *

They had to root around in the main part of the bunker for a few of the inventor’s spare supplies that he kept down here; some of them, when put together in combination with some of the Coon-Wife’s mechanisms (Stan couldn’t understand a word of what Fidds was saying, but it was oddly comforting to hear his old friend spewing his technobabble again), were able to temporarily disable his booby trap. Then, armed with some things from the weapons cabinet, they crept towards the main part of the bunker.

There was a chance Ford had heard the trap disassembling, so they had to move quickly.

Stan put his ear to the door; his hearing wasn’t quite what it used to be, but it was good enough for who it was for, so he was able to pick up some shuffling and creaking. When it sounded like it was a relatively safe distance from the door, he looked over at Fiddleford and held up three fingers.

Fiddleford nodded.

_ Three...two...one… _

Stan flung the door open and lunged inside, ducking just in time to avoid the crossbow bolt that went sailing right through where his head had been before tackling his brother to the floor.

Despite all the time he’d apparently spent just hiding down here, Ford was in pretty good shape for his age; apparently he’d kept up that diet and exercise regimen he was always going on about, because keeping him pinned wasn’t going quite as easily as Stan had hoped. He kept almost squirming free, and (to Stan’s alarm) trying to grab for the crossbow which had been knocked away in the scuffle.

In the end he was forced to slam his fist into his twin’s jaw, which stunned him enough for Fiddleford to come in with the canister of knockout gas.

About a minute later Ford was laying there, completely insensible.

“Eesh.” Stan got unsteadily to his feet and rubbed at a bruise that was starting to form on his cheek. “This ain’t a clone of him or something, right?” He’d once built a machine that could create those, so Stan wouldn’t put it past his brother to make one as a decoy,

Fiddleford grabbed a bottle of water on a nearby table and poured it on Ford’s hand. When nothing happened, he nodded. “Yup, it’s him.”

“Okay, time for Part Two.”

Stan decided not to take any chances with Ford, on account of what Fiddleford had said about that stupid demon’s minions being told to kill him on sight. So, after tying his hands and feet so intricately that he wouldn’t be getting free in a hurry, he put a bag over his head-loose enough that it wouldn’t cut off his air, but still very firmly in place.

Then he, Fiddleford, and the robot worked together to carry the king of New Jersey out of his hiding place, into the open air.

* * *

Much to Stan’s relief, they made it to the junkyard more or less without trouble, besides having to hide from a flock of eye-bats for a few heart-stopping minutes (which nearly turned into a full heart attack when Ford groaned and stirred). As soon as Fiddleford shut the gate behind them they hurried to his shack, and set their prisoner down on the sparse cot that was in one corner, surrounded by whatever the inventor was currently tinkering with. Stan pulled the bag off Ford’s head, and was relieved to see that he was starting to wake up.

The feeling dissipated when Ford’s eyes settled on him-and quickly filled up with rage.

“Firs’ you two infiltrate my sanctuary, conspire together against me, and then you just  _ kidnap _ me?!” Even in the slurred tones of a man who’s not fully conscious yet, the words still stung. “If you think I  _ won’t _ have you incarcerated for  _ life _ you have another thing-”

Stan tossed something thick and papery into his lap, cutting him off. “Take a look at that.”

Ford glanced at his arms, which were still bound behind his back, and then gave Stan an unimpressed glare.

He didn’t feel quite safe untying him yet, so Stan just picked up Dipper’s journal and opened it to the pages at the beginning. “Any of this look familiar?”

The artwork and writing were both done in a clumsy child’s hand, scrawling outside the lines and occasionally mangling the bigger words (and a few times using them without appearing to know what they meant). But there were unmistakable drawings of the symbols that were on their family crest: a clumsy six-fingered hand here, a weird goldfish thing there, a pine tree and a shooting star over there.

Ford stared at them in a kind of dull bewilderment, before looking away. “You could have easily counterfeited those.”

Stan rolled his eyes. “Yeah, sure, I counterfeited a kid’s handwriting all as part of my  _ elaborate scheme _ ta be allowed ta come home. Check the quality of the paper, wise guy.” He showed how the pages were yellowed and crinkled with age, how smudged and faded the writing was from years of being rubbed together.

“If anyone could do it, it’d be you,” Ford muttered stubbornly-but there was a small hint of uncertainty creeping into his voice.

“Well, if you really don’t believe it, you could try testing their blood or whatever, see if they’ve got your DNA.”

Ford looked at him in surprise; apparently he hadn’t realized that Stan remembered the experiments he’d done in that field so long ago.

Stan closed the journal and set it back on his brother’s legs. “I know you’re still mad about what happened. And if I could go back and save ‘em, I would, because as much as you hate me for losin’ ‘em, I promise, Poindexter, it’s not even close ta how much I hate myself.”

Ford’s mouth opened a little bit like he was about to say something; Stan didn’t give him the chance.

“Please...just talk to ‘em, work your blood voodoo or whatever. They don’t remember us, or if they do they haven’t said nothing, but they need a home.”

Ford cleared his throat at last. “You’re not going to give up until I meet these children, are you?”

Stan almost smiled at him, but he was sure it wouldn’t be returned, and he couldn’t deal with that level of hurt right now. “Take a guess.”


	20. Once upon a summer (part 3)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, I'm not waiting twenty-four hours before posting this.  
> Yes, I have gotten some sleep between this chapter and the last one.  
> No, I don't have any regrets about it.  
> ...And yes, I probably deserve the rolled-up newspaper one of you is probably going to smack me with.

Dipper knew he should be more angry at Wendy and Soos than he was. They’d been in on this whole con from the beginning, and they’d lied to them almost as much as Stan had.

But they looked so hurt and betrayed as they made their way back to the cabin that he just didn’t have the heart to yell at them or tell them to go away.

He didn’t have the heart to feel much of anything, to be honest; now that the initial flame of fury had burned out, he mostly just felt numb and drained, and wanted to lie down somewhere and forget the world for a few hours.

Even Mabel had lost her buoyancy; she dragged her feet all the way there, and as soon as they were inside she went and curled up in the big yellow armchair, before pulling the collar of her sweater up over her head, and then curling the rest of her body as far into it as she could.

If he could have, Dipper would have tried to go into Sweater Town too; instead, he just climbed up into the chair next to Mabel and leaned his shoulder against hers. Waddles let out a concerned grunt, and lay down under their feet.

Soos sat down on the giant dinosaur skull that was sitting next to the chair, and Wendy leaned against the back of it with a small, defeated sigh.

After a few minutes of silence, Soos finally asked the question that had been on everyone’s minds: “...What do we do now?”

Dipper shrugged, staring at his shoes.

Wendy finally said, hesitant but clearly trying to sound cheerful, “...Maybe we could just stay here. It seems like a pretty nice place, and I saw it’s got good protections set up against monsters.”

“Stan knows about it,” Dipper muttered; he startled himself with the level of bitterness in his voice.

“Well...maybe we could-”

Whatever Wendy was about to suggest was cut off by the door opening, and a tall, gray-haired man with a red scarf pulled over his face stepping inside.

Without warning Dipper’s angry energy returned with a vengeance. He hopped out of the chair, tiny fists clenched, startling Waddles. He knew it was a fight he would most likely lose, but he was going to give it his darndest anyway.

“Get out of here,” he growled. “We never want to-”

Stan pulled down the scarf, and Dipper’s words cut off with a squeak.

“...You’re not Stan.”

* * *

Ford tilted his head, staring down at the belligerent boy who’d challenged him, as well as the girl, presumably his sister, who was peeking out of the collar of her sweater.

They definitely _looked_ like they could be related to him. Their brown hair was thick and curly enough to be hereditary to the Pines family, and he could sort of see a resemblance to Shermie in their features.

But maybe he was just seeing what he wanted to see.

He knelt to be at their eye level, and offered his hand.

“Greetings.” Then, more self-consciously, “Do people still say greetings?”

The boy startled at the sound of his voice, and gave him a long, searching stare, before lightly placing his small hand in Ford’s.

“Has anyone _ever_ said greetings?” the red-haired young woman who Ford noticed was in this room with them asked dryly. The sarcasm was enough to make him wonder if she was a daughter Stan had neglected to mention having.

“...You have an extra finger.” The boy had let go of his hand, and was now staring at it.

The tone and the staring weren’t hostile or disgusted, just interested (and a little dazed), but it was enough to make Ford instinctively start to pull his hand back.

“Wait, really? I wanna see!”

A second later the girl in the sweater was pushing her brother aside and grabbing his hand in hers. Her mouth dropped open in delight.

“Oh wow, you _do_! That’s incredible! It makes your hand a whole finger friendlier than normal!”

Despite himself, Ford felt the corner of his mouth turn up a little bit. Whether they were his family or not, he liked this kid; she was weird.

The boy was patting the pockets of his vest with increasing levels of franticness. “Where-where’s my journal-”

Ah. Yes.

Ford released the girl’s hand and produced the tattered journal. “Here. Stanley said you would want it back.”

He looked surprised, but then glared as he grabbed it. “Might’ve figured he’d steal it.”

He flipped to the same pages Stan had shown Ford earlier, the ones with doodles of six-fingered hands, staring back and forth between it and Ford’s own hands. His eyes were wide, shocked, and you could almost see his thoughts racing.

If they were acting, they were incredibly good at it.

Ford decided to bite the bullet; he produced a tiny scalpel, and a tiny glass box filled with clear liquid.

“Would you two prick your fingers for me, please?”

The girl startled, and gave him a suspicious glare. “Why, are you going to curse us into falling asleep for a hundred years or until we get true love’s kiss?”

“Wha-no. I want to acquire conclusive evidence one way or another about if you are...who Stan claims.”

The children looked at each other uncertainly, then back at the young woman and the creature who was either a very large, somewhat chubby young man, or a large hairless gopher (either was a possibility in this hellscape environment).

After a second they came and stood behind the children. Neither of them said a word, but the girl (on second thought she probably wasn’t much older than the twins, she was just so tall that it made her look older) was holding her axe in a way that was trying to be casual but had clear intent behind it, and the gopher-man glared at him while clenching his fists.

Ford was reasonably confident that if it came down to an actual fight, he would be able to handle them. But, since he had no intention of actually harming their friends, he didn’t try to assert this too much in his mind. He just waited patiently until the boy took the scalpel.

Ford made sure to clean the scalpel in between acquiring blood samples, but soon enough he’d managed to get a drop from each of them, and from himself, into the tester. Once that was done, he put the lid back on.

“It will take a few minutes for this to complete,” he said, laying the box on the floor. If the liquid changed pure green… “In the meantime...apparently you have a birthmark?” He looked to the boy expectantly.

The boy flushed. “Yeah.” He lifted up his bangs so Ford could see it.

It definitely looked like the one Mason had had. And further examination (i.e. rubbing it with his thumb) showed that it wasn’t drawn on either. Tattooing was possible...but unlikely.

Despite himself, Ford felt his heartbeat picking up.

“...Stanley said you don’t remember things from before you were six.”

“Not really, no. We were found wandering around in the woods down in Piedmont, about a mile from the river, and didn’t know who we were or where we’d come from.”

_“They fell in the river, I-I think they got swept up in the current or something!” A soaking wet, bloodstained, distraught Stanley stood in front of him, looking half mad with grief. “Oh Moses, Sixer, they could be in the ocean by now!”_

Ford swallowed the lump in his throat. “I have a machine somewhere that could possibly be used to help restore them, if you wish.”

Of course, it had been a long time since he’d used Project Mentem, so it might need some repairs, but he could manage that.

“In the meantime, though...I have something else that might help.”

And he reached into his coat again, producing two more journals.

“Whoa, dude, just how much stuff can you keep in your pockets?” the gopher-man asked, sounding awed. “That coat is awesome!”

Ford ignored him, laying them on the floor, face-up. Then, hesitantly, he looked up at the children.

Both of their jaws had dropped, and after a second they twisted to stare at each other...and then back at the journals...and then up at Ford again.

The boy slowly reached into the collar of his shirt, and pulled out a gold chain with a familiar, pine tree-shaped pendant attached to it.

Mabel did the same, except with a shooting star.

If he hadn’t already been sitting down, Ford would have needed to sit down. Come to think of it, he did kind of feel like he needed to sit down regardless of already doing so.

“These’re used to open them...right?” The boy knelt down, and after removing the necklace, pressed the center of it into the middle of the pine tree journal. A few seconds later, it clicked open, revealing pages that were a bit yellow now, but still as beautiful as the day it was first opened.

And as Ford watched the girl do the same to the shooting star journal, he caught a glimpse of the bright green liquid glowing inside the blood test box.

It was possible, but unlikely, for Stan to have found two children who looked that much like their niece and nephew and taught them how to act. He could even (again, possible but unlikely) fake a birthmark, find a pair of necklaces, teach them how to open the journals with them, a million other tricks and lies.

Even with all of this evidence gathered together, there was the slimmest chance that someone could fake things that well.

But you couldn’t fake DNA, no matter how good of a con you were running.

Ford gathered his niece and nephew into his arms in one swift grab.

“You’re alive…” he whispered hoarsely, “You’re both alive…”

And somehow the embrace was enough to help stir another memory in Mabel’s brain.

“G-Grunkle Ford?”

The floodgates opened.

* * *

Outside, on the porch, Stan smiled sadly while he watched through the window.

_Told you, you knucklehead._

Then he shoved his hands into his pockets, and slowly stepped off the porch towards the woods.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There, I gave you guys the reunion between Ford and the kids you wanted. Are you happy now?


	21. Stanford Pines becomes Mr. Exposition

For the last six years, Stanford Pines hadn’t allowed himself to feel much of anything.

Feelings just opened himself up to more pain, more knowledge that he was all alone, more heartache. He’d allowed himself to be angry, yes, but only because at least anger could be a fuel that encouraged him to keep going and figure out how to put a stop to Weirdmageddon and avenge his family once and for all.

But now…

Now he was feeling _everything_ . Every emotion that he’d tried to hold back for the last six years had at last woken up, and all he could do was sit with these children ( _his niece and nephew who he’d thought he’d lost forever_ ) in his lap and let them flow.

It was quite a while before Ford calmed down; he pulled a semi-clean handkerchief from his pocket and used it to wipe his face, and then, seeing how tear-stained the children’s faces were, he gave it to them to do the same.

And then a realization made him sit up straight with a jolt.

“Where’s Stanley?!”

His brother had brought their niece and nephew home.

After all this time, despite all evidence pointing to the contrary, he’d found them.

And Ford had-he’d told him-

Oh no. What had he done?

The surge of guilt nearly reduced him to a sobbing wreck again.

The gopher-man shrugged. “Haven’t seen Mr. B-Mr. _Pines_ -” his mouth widened in a delighted smile. “Hey, y’know, that fits him a whole lot better, actually. Mr. Pines. Man, I gotta get used to saying that.”

“We haven’t seen him since we left your hiding spot,” the redhead said, finally straightening up from her slouched position.

Mason bit his lip, looking as guilty as Ford felt.

Mabel, however, jumped to her feet. “We gotta go find him! C’mon, let’s go!”

“Mabel, he could be anywhere by now!” her brother argued.

She put her hands on her hips. “He’s our grunkle too, Dipper! He was probably just keeping secrets because he was afraid to tell us the truth!”

“I know that!” Mason (Dipper?) snapped. “I just don’t know where to start!”

Ford interrupted.

“I know where he might have gone.”

* * *

Just as Stan had suspected, the old sailboat resting at the dock wasn’t in any better shape than the cabin had been.

He sighed tiredly as he hopped inside, and began checking her over.

No apparent leaks or evidence of rotting or termites, thankfully, but she still needed to be bailed out, and it had been a while since anyone had painted or cleaned her.

_Well, better get started. Not like I can take it with me or anything, but it’ll be one last errand before I go._

Stan picked up a bucket lying in a corner, and began to bail out the water, along with a few nasty bits and pieces that he wasn’t interested in trying to figure out right now. He lost himself in the work, until at last the boat was, if not dry, at least comparatively clean down in the bilges. Once that was done, he pulled out one of the old rags that was still in the cleaning cupboard, and wiped down a few surfaces halfheartedly. Ultimately, though, he just ended up sitting down at the prow with the rag in his lap, and staring mournfully at the lake in front of him.

He was startled out of the trance the waves had put him in by the sound of footsteps on the dock. In a flash Stan leaped to his feet, brandishing his cane like a sword-and then he stumbled back a step, mouth flapping open stupidly in bewilderment.

“I had a feeling you’d be here,” said Ford.

Stan stared at him goggle-eyed, still not lowering his cane.

Before the tension could grow too much, though, Mabel popped out from behind Ford like a jack-in-the-box with Dipper (looking somewhat reluctant) at her heels.

“Grunkle Stan! You guys have a boat?! No, wait-I think I remember you telling us about it, you said you built it yourselves when you were kids! Right, Dipper?”

The boy nodded slowly, hands shoved in his pockets and not quite meeting his great-uncle’s eye. “Yeah, I-I think so. You said…” his young face screwed up in concentration, “...that you once caught a giant squid and tried to bring it into the boat, but it was so big you nearly sunk it.”

Mabel lit up. “I remember that now! Grunkle Ford did this awesome shadow puppet of it on the wall to show us how big it was, while Grunkle Stan did the scary sound effects-”

“What’re you lot doing here?” Stan finally asked.

* * *

Ford felt the smile that had been tugging on his mouth as the children remembered the story they’d told them so long ago die away.

“...Isn’t it obvious why we’re here?”

“...No.” Stan lowered his cane at last, but nothing else about his posture relaxed. He still looked like he expected them to lunge forward and attack him at any second.

Then again, maybe he thought they were an illusion, or some kind of monsters in disguise.

“Stanley, it’s really us. If you don’t believe us, there should still be some charms on this thing so-”

“I know it’s you.”

The flat tone was like a cut to the chest, but it made the answer for his brother’s behavior become clear to him at last: _He doesn’t trust me anymore._

It hurt to have the man who had been his best friend since before they were even born, basically, looking at him with suspicion and wariness. But he only had to remember what he’d said and done to him to know that he had no right to be surprised by it.

“Stan…” He took a small step forward, and flinched when Stan’s shoulders visibly tightened. “I-I was wrong.”

His twin’s bushy gray eyebrows raised. “...You feeling okay, Stanford? It sounded for a sec like you just said you were wrong about something.”

Under lighter circumstances he might have worked up the energy to be indignant about that. Here and now, though, all he did was step closer again, encouraged by the thought that if Stan was capable of sarcasm maybe there was a chance that he could try to fix things. “Please. I know I’ve hurt you in unforgivable ways, and I have no right to ask for a second chance, but...please.”

Stan clenched his jaw, staring down at the deck of the boat and tapping the tip of his cane in agitation.

Mabel piped up again. “...If it’s not too personal, could one of you fill us in, please?”

“Yeah, dude,” said the young gopher-man, “I need some backstory information for my fanfiction.”

Ford pondered for a moment (partly to wonder what on earth a fanfiction was), before sitting down on the edge of the dock. Within seconds his niece had perched at his side, looking up at him expectantly. Dipper looked at the water a little uncomfortably, but sat down by Ford’s other side. Stan’s children (?) made themselves comfortable at the edges of the group; the girl was resting her axe on her shoulder, but other than that they both relaxed.

Stan finally shrugged, and went back to sitting on the prow with his arms folded.

Ford cleared the lump in his throat as best he could, and began to talk.

“Many years ago, before any of you besides Stanley and I were born, I foolishly associated myself with the demon who has been terrorizing our country.”

Four pairs of wide eyes stared at him; Ford clenched his hands together in his lap and stared down at them.

“He claimed to be a muse who would help me in my studies of the mysteries and magic of our world. If Stanley had not been there to make me realize my folly in trusting him, I am sure that he would have entered our world and made chaos reign down on us a lot sooner. As it was, I was able to end my affiliation with him, and wrote down the experience in one of my research journals as a warning to myself and future generations.

“Unfortunately-” Ford swallowed guiltily- “sometime later, I made the acquaintance of a young man who appeared to have the same interest in the supernatural as myself, who became my apprentice. I taught him everything I’d learned in my studies of this valley, and thought that he would carry on my research after I was gone.” He paused to look out at the forest. “...Yet again, though, I allowed myself to be tricked. It turned out that he intended to use the things I taught him as a way to gain power over others, and manipulate and control them. As soon as I found out, I ended his apprenticeship and hoped that would put an end to the affair. Instead...he caused all this.”

Ford gestured at the blood red sky.

“He discovered the place in my journal that discussed the demon I had associated with, and they joined forces. It was thanks to their unholy alliance that Weirdmageddon started...and our family was destroyed.”

He closed his eyes, trying to fight back the stinging in them. The children sat in stunned silence, and he allowed them a few minutes to process all that. Then he whispered, “I managed to imprison him, at least for the time being...but not in time to stop the chaos from reigning.”

“I-” Dipper swallowed- “I remember what comes next. We were...being chased by something. Some kind of...teeth monster?” He glanced at Mabel for confirmation, and she nodded. “And then...we fell in a river.”

Ah. That explained his apparent nervousness in proximity to large bodies of water. Ford inadvertently put a protective hand on his nephew’s shoulder.

“Yup.”

It took them a moment to realize that Stan had finally spoken.

He was staring down at his boots even as he continued to talk; still with that flat tone.

“I told you two ta run while I fought off the monster, and I didn’t see in time that there was a river up ahead, and you two fell in it and got washed away before I could save you. And when Ford found out that I screwed up, he banished me.”

“I didn’t _mean_ it!”

The cry burst out before Ford could think about it. And he had to admit it wasn’t the best defense ever; Stan didn't think so either, if the flat stare he gave him was any evidence. He decided to clarify.

“I didn’t think you’d actually _leave_! You never listened to me when I tried to give you orders before!”

“Well, I’d never apparently killed the last remaining members of our family before.” Stan’s fingers clenched around his cane so tightly they looked like they were about to snap it in half. “Plus you basically threatened ta have me thrown in the dungeon if you ever saw me again.”

“What happened wasn’t your fault! I was just mad, and looking for someone to blame, and you were an easy target because the only other option was to admit that this whole mess was all my-”

Ford froze as the impact of his words slowly sank in. His mouth trembled, and he bit down on his lip in an attempt to calm it.

At last he admitted the truth, in a strangled whisper.

“...I’m a horrible brother.”

* * *

There was another long moment of silence.

Then Wendy nodded.

“Yeah, you really kinda suck.”

She was closest to the boat; that made it easier for Stan to lean over and cuff the back of her head.

“What? Everyone was thinking it!” She rubbed her skull with an indignant glare.

Stan frowned at her. “Kid, what’ve I told ya about kicking people when they’re down?”

She sighed. “‘Only do it if you think you can handle the consequences.’”

“Right. And trust me, you’re not gonna be able ta handle the consequences if ya don’t shut your yap right now.”

Wendy rolled her eyes, but she did shut up.

He turned his attention back to Ford.

Stan was surprised to realize that his brother was crying.

It was silent, but there was a long line of tears trailing down from each eye, making him look unbelievably pitiful and broken and un-Ford-like.

Despite the hurt that he had to admit he was still feeling, remembering the rage and spite that had been in those eyes six years ago...Stan didn’t want to stay mad. And not just because Ford had clearly had the pride crushed right out of him.

“...I shouldn’t’ve left you ta deal with bein’ king all by yourself,” he admitted. “Cuz from the look of things you kinda mucked it up.”

Ford barked out a mirthless laugh and rubbed his eyes on his sleeve. “You have no idea.”

Mabel, of course, had snuggled up into her grunkle’s side like the comforting cuddle bug she was, and now she looked over at Stan and made a little “come here” gesture.

Stan hesitated; he wasn’t sure if he was ready for that-or if Ford was, either.

She beckoned again, more insistently; Ford noticed what she was doing, and gave Stan a cautious look, before holding out his hand to him.

“I’m sorry, Stan. I-I want-I would like to at least try to make it up to you. If there’s any way I can.”

Stan never got the chance to answer one way or the other.

He was cut off by a gleeful voice from behind them, near the edge of the dock.

“Well, well! Ain’t this just the _cutest_ family reunion?!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh, don't look so surprised, people.  
> You all knew this was coming.


	22. The battle of Gravity Falls

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: there’s going to be a somewhat graphic part in here.

There is nothing quite as nasty as the triumph of someone who wants to do horrible things to you and who has you at their (nonexistent) mercy.

And it’s especially unpleasant to experience when it’s emblazoned on a smug, chubby face composed of pale, sagging, rotting flesh, which is grinning horribly as it stands over you and your family with evil intent.

Ford instantly remedied at least one of those problems by standing up, and pushing the children behind him when they followed suit, so that while the grin of triumph was still there, at least it had to look up at him to do so.

Silently Ford cursed himself for not covering his face before leaving the Shack; undoubtedly this was how this monster had found them, one of his minions must have seen him. Then he felt a flood of even sharper panic race into his heart. Gideon was free! That meant that by the same token,  _ Bill _ was free! The little ventriloquist dummy’s bloodshot eyes had no yellow in them at the moment, but that didn’t prove anything-his family was all gathered together in one spot, right where he could get at them, because once again Ford hadn’t thought things through like he knew he was capable of!

A muscle under Gideon’s eye twitched at no longer being able to tower over them, but he continued with his spiel nonetheless.

“Will you lookit how the years have changed us, Stanford? You-” He paused, and looked him up and down. “Well, I guess you’re still a smelly old man. Same with you, Stanley.”

Stan snorted, and muttered something along the lines of, “That really the best insult you got, shortstack?” as he stepped up onto the dock with his family.

“But look what’s become o’ your niece and nephew! They’ve both grown up so much-Mabel  _ especially _ .” He leered in a way that had Ford just  _ barely _ refraining from lunging forward to wring his chubby little neck. “And as for widdle ol’ me?” His eyebrows lowered into a dark glare. “I’ve been turned into a  _ rotting corpse _ , thanks ta you.”

“If you’re looking for an apology, after  _ everything _ you’ve done, you’re even more delusional than I realized,” Ford said icily.

Gideon guffawed, in a way that made him sound like a snorting pig in addition to looking like one. “Oh, I’m looking for something far more permanent than that, Stanford. Something like, oh, the end of the Pines family, like I promised to bring about-agh!”

It took Ford a confused second to realize that the reason why Gideon had stopped his evil monologue was because there was now an axe sticking out of his sternum.

The wound spurted with a viscous black substance that oozed down the boy’s shirtfront and dribbled down onto his shoes; he gurgled, looking bewildered more than anything else, before looking down at himself and letting out an affronted shriek.

“My  _ shirt _ ! Do you have any idea how much this thing  _ cost _ ?!”

“Ugh,” said the redhead girl, standing up and rolling up her sleeves, “doesn’t he  _ ever _ shut up on his own?”

Ford decided that he definitely liked Stan’s daughter, even if he was a little annoyed that he’d never bothered to mention her to him (but they could talk about that later, after destroying this abomination once and for all). He decided to take advantage of the boy’s shock, and lunged, while producing another weapon he’d designed in the bunker: a glove that could generate lightning. He’d never tried it on a zombie before, but he was willing to bet it would be a nice shock to his system (pun completely intended).

He was just a few steps away, though, when Gideon jerked his head back up-

-and he wasn’t Gideon anymore.

**_“Nice try, Stanford, but you’ve got a two-for-one special! And the second course just showed up!”_ **

Bill waved his hand, and Ford’s limbs were suddenly encased in glowing blue chains that jerked him into the air like a grotesque marionette.

“Grunkle Ford!”

Two voices called out to him, and there was a loud thudding of two sets of tiny feet running across the dock.

Ford’s heart seized in terror.

_ No no no NO _

“Kids! Run-!” he tried to call out-before another manacle clamped around his neck, briefly choking him into silence.

**_“Awww, isn’t that sweet? Pinetree and Shooting Star, coming to the rescue!”_ ** Bill slowly pulled the axe out of his chest, and poked at the gaping wound it had left, cackling.  **_“Wow, pain is hilarious! This would probably feel even better if this body were still alive!”_ ** Then he twirled the axe, and gave the children a savage grin.  **_“How’s about we see what this can do to-agh!”_ **

He was sent flying backwards by the long, barbed object that had slammed right into the spot where the axe had been.

“Ha! GRAPPLING HOOK!” Mabel yelled triumphantly; she retracted the hook back, and then twirled the gun around her finger (the coolness of the action was somewhat undermined by her smacking herself in the chin and then losing her grip on the grappling hook, but she managed to avoid dropping it in the nick of time).

A few seconds later the chains vanished, and Ford plummeted back to the ground.

* * *

“Nice shot, pumpkin!” Stan crowed; he stopped to help Ford up, and then charged, wielding his cane like a bat. He was so ready to smash that little mutant-triangle-whatever he was now into powder; judging by their presence on either side of him, so were Soos and Wendy.

Ford’s weird glove thing had started glowing again; just as Bill got to his feet again, he raised it, and a burst of lightning shot out.

This time, though, the demon was ready for it. One of his hands raised, and kind of- _ absorbed _ the lightning or something, Stan didn’t know the technical term for it. A second later he sent it flying right back at Ford.

The nerd barely dodged in time, thank heaven, and the distraction gave Dipper a chance to tackle the boy to the ground.

He grabbed one arm, and pinned it down; before Bill could lash out at him with the other one, Mabel caught it and pinned it down too. And the Soos surged forward and sat down heavily on his legs, which created a gross crunching noise but at least appeared to subdue him. Stan was a little disappointed about not getting to take a whack at him...but proud of his kids for handling it so well.

“What do we do with him, Grunkle Ford?!” Mabel called over her shoulder. “I don’t think we can hold him for long!”

“Grab the amulet!” Ford pointed to it. “It’s the source of his power!”

Dipper was just reaching out to snatch it, when-

**_“ENOUGH!!!!”_ **

A harsh, blue-green light suddenly surged around all six of them, lifting them into the air and pinning their arms to their sides; a second later Bill slowly got to his feet, not appearing to care about the fact that his meat puppet’s legs were bending in ways they really weren’t supposed to bend.

**_“I gotta admit, having this fight with you mortals was fun-cute, even!”_ ** he snarled.  **_“But I made a deal with Gideon six years ago to get rid of the Pines family, and it’s high time for me to collect my due!”_ ** A hand went to his chin (or at least where a chin would be on a normal person whose neck wasn’t a short blob of fat connecting their head to their shoulders) in pretend thought.  **_“Question is, which of you should I kill first? Decisions, decisions…”_ **

“No!” Ford struggled in vain against his magical bonds. “Bill-you can’t-”

**_“Oh, like there’s_ ** **anything** **_that can stop me!”_ ** Bill smirked at him, yellow eyes dancing with dark delight.  **_“Though actually, I’ve narrowed it down a bit, Stanford-I’m gonna make sure to save_ ** **you** **_for last, so you can watch your family die. One. By._ ** **ONE** **_.”_ **

He let that sink in for a second, before he turned his gaze back to his other prisoners.  **_“Hmm...so many options...I’ll have to be methodical about this.”_ ** He lifted a finger and began pointing it back and forth between them.  **_“Eenie...meenie...miney...y-”_ **

Nobody, not even Bill, had noticed the blonde girl stepping out of the trees and creeping up behind him, until her pale hand wrapped around the amulet and ripped it from his neck.

Bill (or was it Gideon now?) shrieked and tried to snatch it back, but by then she’d already leaped out of reach, and tossed it up towards the people who were now tumbling towards the ground. A large hand managed to reach out and catch it just in time.

Stan got to his feet, glowering down at the little monster who’d ruined his life.

“Y-you give that back!” Gideon shrieked. The amulet clenched in Stan’s hand pulsed with an angry light, as if in agreement; he could almost hear the triangle’s whine emanating from it. “Give it back or I’ll tear you to pieces-”

Stan just said icily, “This is for my family.”

He flung the amulet to the ground, and slammed the tip of his cane down on top of it.

* * *

Instantly the amulet shattered; seconds later, it was like the very air around them exploded.

A burst of bright turquoise light erupted around the little group, sending them flying in all directions. Dipper managed to grab onto Mabel’s hand, but only for a few seconds before they were wrenched apart; he skidded across the sand, and tumbled to a halt against a tree, knocking the wind out of him. All he could do was lie on his side and watch as the light was suddenly sucked away by an unseen wind, rising above the lake-and towards the giant X hovering in the middle of the sky.

Gideon only had a second to screech in a combination of anguish and terror, before his body began to do something that could only be described as a little between crumbling and melting.

What flesh was left on his body crumpled in on itself with a sickly wet noise, folding in and curling down until all that was left was a ball of nasty-looking blue cloth; after a second that dissolved away too, revealing a tiny white skeleton-and soon even that had disappeared into dust, which curled through the air towards the X.

As Dipper’s dazed eyes darted left and right, he realized that other things were disappearing up into the X too.

Monsters of all shapes and sizes were being yanked out of the forest, and apparently from other places too, pulled away into that chaotic streak of light-a giant teeth monster, some kind of purple creature with a cape and one eye in the middle of her forehead, a dark, horned demon with a pacifier in the middle of its stomach-all of them vanished, along with chaos bubbles, and, seemingly, the very sky itself! The red color was disappearing, leaving behind a strange-yet-oddly-familiar deep blue-black color, as it was all sucked up into the X-

Which abruptly sealed itself shut, and then vanished without a trace.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hopefully this was intense enough for you people.
> 
> Also, I'm having way too much fun with Ford just assuming that Wendy and Soos are Stan's children; can you tell?


	23. Brand New Day

For a horrifying moment Dipper thought he’d gone blind. Either that, or somehow Bill had taken all the light along with him when he was destroyed.

Suddenly everything had become so  _ dark _ , in a way that it hadn’t been since-since-

Oh, wait. Was this-was this  _ nighttime _ ?

Dipper stared at the sky for a few seconds longer, and managed to make out a few pale pinpricks of light in the inky blackness that he realized had to be stars.

_ Whoa. So that’s what that looks like. I’d...well, I’d literally forgotten. _

_...Wait, that means that the Big Dipper’s somewhere up there, like my name! _

He stared at the sky in earnest, trying to remember where it was-

-until he was startled out of it by Mabel’s voice crying out.

“Grunkle Stan!”

Dipper sat up with a jolt-and instantly realized why that had been a bad idea, when his sore head and back throbbed, but it wasn’t important compared to figuring out where his family was!

Dipper squinted through the darkness, and barely managed to make out the faint silhouette of his sister running towards him; he still had trouble realizing how close she was until she grabbed him by the arm and pulled him to his feet.

“Grunkle Stan’s gone!”

“What?!”

That was Grunkle Ford’s voice; a second later there was a humming noise, and that glove he’d been wearing began to glow again. This time, though, he didn’t try to shoot lightning, he just held it up so that it lit up the surrounding area, while turning in a little circle. “Stanley! Where are you?!” he called frantically.

“Mr. Pines?!” Soos called out in equal panic.

Horrifyingly, there was no sign of their great uncle in the spot where he’d been standing.

Dipper’s heart plunged into his stomach.

What if-what if he’d somehow been pulled into whatever place all the horrors had been sent to? What if, because he’d been the one to smash the amulet, there’d been some kind of consequence, like he hadn’t-

There was a loud splash from the lake, and a large figure surged up onto the bank, groaning and rubbing its back with one hand.

“Oh, ow...everything hurts.”

“Grunkle Stan!”

Dipper and Mabel started to run towards him-but someone else got there first.

Grunkle Ford barely seemed to remember in time that he was still wearing the lightning glove, and it probably wasn’t a good idea to touch someone with it; he ripped it off and tossed it over his shoulder in one fluid motion (thankfully it stayed lit up), before flinging his arms around his brother and nearly sending both of them into the lake again.

“Whoa, what the-?!” Stan managed to stagger them both more inland, staring uncertainly at the figure who was still clinging to him. His arms flapped a little helplessly on either side of him.

Ford made no attempt to let go; he just muttered something into his brother’s damp coat and seemed to cling on tighter.

Stan looked startled, and more than a little uncertain (not that Dipper could blame him, considering how Ford had treated him)...but at last one arm cautiously came up and curled around his back, followed by the other one.

They only broke apart when Mabel surged forward, brother in tow, so they could try to dive bomb both grunkles at once. They made it easier by kneeling down so they could each scoop a child into their arms, and (at least in Stan’s case, if anyone asked) get quite a bit of glitter in their eyes.

Seconds later they were joined by Soos (in blubbering ball of happiness form), and Wendy (more stoic, but still pretty dang joyful).

For the longest time they just sat there holding each other, too relieved and overjoyed and a bunch of other messy emotions to do or think about anything else. At last, though, Dipper looked up, and saw two things:

  1. The sky had started changing color to a still very dark, but absolutely beautiful blue-in particular when compared to the harsh, angry red it had been for so long; this also meant that it was becoming a little easier to see everyone.
  2. The blonde girl who had snatched the amulet was standing uncomfortably at the edge of the group, staring at them and looking very uncertain.



* * *

Wendy finally noticed the latter too; she twisted around and narrowed her eyes at her.

“Who’re you?”

The girl shoved a lock of hair over her shoulder. “Someone who is  _ definitely not _ anyone’s minion.”

“...No offense, but that doesn’t really clear anything up.”

She made an annoyed sound. “Forget it. It-who I am’s not important-”

“You’re that Northwest kid.”

She froze, and her eyes darted towards Stan, who had spoken.

“Uh-”

He nodded with realization. “Yeah, I  _ knew _ I recognized ya from somewhere!”

“Wait a sec!” Mabel spun around to stare at her. “ _ Pacifica _ ?!”

The girl blinked. “Y-you remember my name?”

“Yeah, you used to make fun of my sweaters whenever your parents were around, but when we were alone we’d play mini-golf! It was fun!”

She stared at them in a kind of bewildered way; whatever reception she’d been expecting, clearly this wasn’t it.

Ford was giving her a bit of a suspicious glare, but Stan just smiled. “Nice job helpin’ us out, kid. Thanks.”

Pacifica’s mouth opened, then shut. Then opened again, visibly trembling in the light of Grunkle Ford’s lightning glove.

Then she suddenly crumpled forward, more or less falling into Stan’s chest as her little shoulders trembled.

“...What’d I say?”

Even as he looked at the others in confusion, Stan gently put a hand on the girl’s back and rubbed a little circle into it.

“Th-thank you…” she croaked into his coat. “Thank you.”

“...Yeah, no problem.”

* * *

As the sky got lighter and lighter, the little group sat together and watched it change.

And marveled as, for the first time in ages, the golden sun rose in a warm blue sky over New Jersey.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...And Stan just adopted another kid.  
> What can I say, he makes a great unconventional parental substitute.


	24. Life is a road/At the beginning

Eventually, they ended up just making their way back to the house, and making themselves comfortable in the living room (nobody felt like splitting up at the moment) before collapsing into the sleep of the physically and emotionally exhausted. There were other things that would have to be figured out sooner rather than later, but that was a problem for the future Pines family.

After taking a few days just to rest and recuperate, they decided, reluctant though they were, to go out and get started dealing with those problems.

The easiest to deal with was the fact that Soos and Wendy wanted to go back to Glass Shard Beach and find out what had become of their families; McGucket was kind enough to lend them one of his giant robots to make the trip a little quicker than usual, and a few days later they came back, with a sanguine-faced old woman, a redheaded giant of a man, and three redheaded boys.

(“...Who’s that?” Ford asked, looking at the man with some slight confusion as he jumped off the robot and helped his children down.

“That’s Wendy’s dad. He’s some kinda lumberjack,” Stan said. “...Why’re ya giving me that look?”

“So she’s not-yours?”

“ _Huh_?!”)

It made the house a bit more crowded, but “Manly” Dan was more than happy to build additions onto it. He also cut some lumber to help rebuild houses for some of the townsfolk, which made them happy enough to trade him some food and other supplies; Stan, at the same time, convinced him to add on some rooms big enough for some kind of idea he had about creating “exhibitions” (Ford was suspicious of what that was supposed to mean, but Stan told him not to worry about it for right now).

* * *

Then a week after that, a man and woman who had once been very distinguished-looking, but were now in the very tattered remains of their finery, wandered into town claiming that they had heard their daughter Pacifica was here, and they wanted to reclaim her. They were directed by some of the villagers towards this big wooden shack just outside the main area, where they thought they might have seen her. When they showed up and knocked at the door, Stan answered, with a large wooden club slung over his shoulder, and asked, “Aren’t you the two yahoos who abandoned your child ta potentially starve to death in the remains of a ruined castle for six years?”

For some strange reason they left very swiftly, and never returned.

* * *

The little group of people had to spend quite a bit of time getting used to each other again, especially the two oldest Pines twins.

The first time Stan and Ford got in a real argument about something, Stan ended up having a small panic attack in a corner of the kitchen, and it took his brother nearly ten minutes to calm him down and assure him that he wasn't going to try to banish him again.

Everyone kept having nightmares, so it became standard practice for one person to wake up and find someone else had climbed into the bed with them looking for solace; thankfully, nobody tried to judge anyone else about this, they'd just offer them a larger share of the blankets and then go back to sleep.

* * *

The biggest problem, of course, was what to be done about the kingdom.

To put it mildly, thanks to Weirdmageddon the kingship had been shot to hell in a handbasket. The whole royal family and most of their court had vanished in one fell swoop, and things like class distinction and money had ceased to have meaning, so for the most part different towns and villages had just taken charge of themselves, and created their own miniature forms of government. Whole new trade routes had been established, new alliances and systems, everything that had been set in stone for generations had been turned on its head.

Ford spent days worrying himself about how to get things back to normal, until Stan pulled him aside and pointed out three things:

  1. There was only a little bit of the original royal family left, and of the four of them, Ford had tried being king and been terrible at it, Stan didn’t want the job, and the kids were too young for the crown which would mean one of _them_ would have to rule in their stead for a while, and he’d already pointed out the problems with that.
  2. The people of New Jersey seemed pretty happy with what they’d set up during Weirdmageddon, so why interfere with a good thing?
  3. _Not_ trying to reassume the throne and rule over New Jersey would give all of them plenty of time to just live peaceful lives here in Gravity Falls, happily studying anomalies just like old times while getting to know each other all over again.



Ford looked hesitant.

“...I don’t know, Stanley. Dad wouldn’t want-”

“ _Screw_ Dad. What do _you_ want?”

He thought about it, and considered...and finally came to a decision.

* * *

The people of New Jersey were a little confused when the Pines family never tried to reclaim the throne, or even step up to formally announce if they were still alive or not, but eventually they just shrugged it off and adjusted to their new, relatively monster-free lives, as humanity is wont to do if left to its own devices and if it’s not a group of teenage boys left alone on a desert island somewhere, because in that case they’re more likely to all go psycho and start murdering each other.

...In a random, nonspecific example.

In any case, soon enough the first day of summer was coming to a close, with the sun setting over the Gravity Falls lake. It was mostly unoccupied, except for the small-yet-sturdy sailboat in the middle of the water with a little group of people onboard, who were trying to catch a glimpse of the legendary sea dinosaur supposedly living beneath the waves.

Dipper was feeling secure and safe in a puffy yellow vest that Grunkle Ford called a “life jacket,” so even if he did fall into the still-somewhat-terrifying water at least he would be at less risk of drowning; this, combined with his excitement over potentially seeing the elusive Gobblewonker while spending time with his family, were making him feel less afraid around water than he’d ever been. He leaned a nonchalant elbow against the boat railing, watching Grunkle Stan and Mabel making each other laugh by pretending to eat some of the fish food they’d brought out here to try and tempt the Gobblewonker into showing itself; nearby, Wendy and Pacifica had dared Soos into _actually_ eating some of the fish food, and were laughing as he attempted to scrub the horrible taste away from his tongue. Grunkle Ford was sitting next to Dipper, sketching the scene in his journal and smiling contentedly.

Dipper leaned his head on his uncle’s shoulder, and his face relaxed into his own smile.

It was good to be home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Cue the credits song*  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1LTwvNecBDw


End file.
